he misfiring Keble XI finally registered a victory in the league in a topsy-turvy tussle with Wadham.
Keble captain, Peter Bolton, won the toss and decided to bat, no doubt keen to protect his fragile batting line-up still bearing the scars of Sunday’s failure to chase a modest 133 in cuppers semi-final.
The decision appeared to have backfired as a succession of early wickets fell to the impressive opening pairing of Smith and Parkinson, who cleaned up the flamboyant Stobbs and doughty Bland with successive deliveries in the final over of an extremely classy spell.
However, Nik Baker stood firm in the face of the Wadham attack, effortlessly pushing lofted drives to the boundary.
When Baker eventually fell for 46 runs the Keble batting line-up looked to their talented lower order to salvage the innings. With some powerful hitting coming from Simon Ackroyd and a surprisingly aggressive Tom Ouldridge, the Keble total reached a defendable 181 runs. Ackroyd and Ouldridge whipped up a rapid and impressive 110 run partnership, with both batsmen peppering the straight boundaries, much to the torment of the Wadham second and third change bowlers.
The Wadham batsmen took the crease with an air of confidence, keen to compensate for their recent loss in Cuppers and to capitalize on the return to action of several key finalists following exam commitments. However, despite some intimidating shots in the pre-game nets, they never really found any rhythm.
With Bolton opening the innings with a wicket maiden, there was very little room for improvement as the Wadham scoreboard soon read three wickets for a pitiful and rather embarrassing ten runs.
Potential dangers were removed from the crease in the forms of Coperman and captain Parkinson as the Keble opening attack of Bolton and ever-accurate Harvey stuck to their guns, constantly forcing the batsmen to play as they nagged away in the so-called ‘corridor of uncertainty’ outside off stump.
With such a rapid turnover of batsmen there was no room for the Wadham line-up to attempt anything other than survival. Tom Harvey capitalized on this and absolutely devastated Wadham with his devilish inswing bowling.
The slight paceman was successful time and again, taking the ridiculously impressive figures of 7 wickets for only 9 runs in his 8 overs.
Sheer consistency from Harvey combined with cutting sledging from Ainsworth and a celebratory over from James Seddon saw Keble complete their whitewash of the demoralized Wadham side, bowling them out in less than 16 overs, for only 28 runs.
Given the strength and previous performances of Wadham’s batsmen such a collapse was certainly unexpected and doubtless some of the more senior players will look back and regret some of their shot choices.
This comprehensive victory over Wadham may re-inspire the Keble first XI as they hope to close out the season with a new lease of life. Admittedly Cuppers glory was snatched from their grasp, but the chance to confirm their threat as a league side has left Keble relishing the two eigth week match-ups.
