Stand in Skipper Peter Lorenzini led the seconds to an impressive 7 wicket win against Denton West, taking all five points, on a sun soaked Saturday at ‘The Heys’. Having lost the toss and being asked to field, Pete Lorenzini rallied the troops with his stated mission of taking all ten ‘West’ wickets, enabling a possible five pointer.
A friend close to Pete Lorenzini told us, ‘Before the match, PL had spoke to the team about the importance of a full five points, telling them’, “We need all five today, cos we’re only on 24 points out of a possible 30 so far, and for us that’s @!$%”.
John Walters responded to the call, with an opening salvo that kept ‘Wests’ advance in check, before PL took to the front himself, removing the useful Maynard with only the third shot of his opening salvo. ‘West’ withered, while the cavalry gained ground, wicket by wicket, slowly gaining ground without much resistance, until that is ‘West’s’ battle hardened Foreman entered the melee.
Foreman’s first strike in anger, put the otherwise economical Walters over the score box, losing the ball in the process. Further Foreman firecrackers off Lorenzini’s bowling, saw the ball visiting distant parts, until his counter attack was brought to a halt with the deployment of Montgomery.
Speaking afterwards, the Field Marshal who earlier had claimed 4 for 24 from 12 overs said, “For a moment it looked like PL was on the ropes, but by cleverly retreating, he then redeployed the ranks, which helped us take the fight back to them and we finished them off for 126. Dave Taylor was great in the field, taking all three catches that came his way and Tom Gibson also chipped in with a good spell of 2 for 12 from 6 overs”.
West weren’t beat yet though, their opening bowlers harrying the Prestwich batsmen for over after over of excellent bowling, incredibly missing the killer blow time and again. The usually untroubled Dave Taylor looked shell shocked, unable to get the incoming in his sights, until eventually falling to the almost inevitable end.
‘Dad’s Army’ though, heeding Lorenzini’s call to arms earlier, bravely fought on with McAndrew taking it to the opposition with an excellent 54 not out, and the limpet like Fiorentini digging in as support, only relenting on 31 in the final throes of the campaign.
Afterwards, McAndrew reflected: “They bowled really well at us out there, but I kept saying to Fordy over and over ‘Don’t panic, Don’t panic!’, it helped us settle the nerves and get on with the task”.
The devilishly dynamic Fiorentini added: “For a while there it was tough, but when Jamie got going, I thought I could see it through.”
It was not to be though, his red pen finally running out with only 30 or so runs required, which left Tom Gibson (9) and Jon O’Connor (5 n.o), to continue in support of McAndrew, the spoils of war eventually going to an impressive Prestwich.
A source close to the team, after the win told us that they would now be rehydrating with the appropriate isotonics and later gather their thoughts for a tough game tomorrow against Flowery Field.
