Skipper Simon Bowen has backed his Whitchurch batsmen to recapture their best form ahead of Saturday’s Birmingham League third division clash at home to under-achieving Ombersley.
The Heath Road men have found runs hard to come by over the last month, a point reinforced by last weekend’s hugely disappointing 138 run drubbing at Shropshire rivals Bridgnorth.
But Bowen remains confident he’s got the players at his disposal to put things right and this weekend his batting line up is strengthened by the timely return of Simon Gregory, probably for the last time this season owing to his footballing commitments with Market Drayton Town.
“We’ve got to get back to decent batting form as quickly as we can, and hopefully it’s just around the corner as we’ve got some good batters,” said Bowen. “Every game seems to be a tough one when you’re in sketchy form as we are at the moment. We’re not in great form, particularly with our batting, but we’ve just got to pull together and scrape a win from somewhere.”
Bowen is optimistic it might arrive this weekend, not that he’s in any mood to under-estimate an Ombersley side with a sprinkling of former first class players, among them former Worcestershire men Matt Rawnsley and Duncan Catterall, who also had a spell as a professional for Shropshire.
Another ex-county man, Ted Baylis, is also expected to be on the opposition team sheet. “On paper they’ve got a great side and they’ve had a disappointing season by their standards,” he said.
“But they’re a dangerous side with some dangerous players.”
What is certain is that Whitchurch will need to perform much better in all departments than they did in coming unstuck so heavily at Bridgnorth. Ryan Lockley top scored with 74 while Adam Smith (56), Jack Edwards (31) and Herefordshire regular David Exall (29) also weighed in as Bridgnorth totalled an imposing 252-7 from their 55 overs. Dan Bowen was the pick of the visiting attack with 2-51 and Amjaad Ali Khan claimed 2-86.
Whitchurch’s reply was far from convincing as they were blown away for just 116 inside 40 overs. Opener Maisam Hasnain hit 40 and Andy Ince and Oliver 17 apiece as the Whitney brothers inflicted much of the damage with county ace Jono snaring 5-35 and Sam 4-21.
“Losing so heavily was a bit of a shock and we just didn’t turn up really which was a big disappointment for such a big game,” added the captain. “They performed far better than us with the ball and got more out it by putting the ball in the right areas.”
Whitchurch duo Dan Bowen and Simon Bowen were the unfortunate duo from Shropshire’s 13-man squad to be left out of the XI for yesterday’s MCCA Trophy final against Lincolnshire at Durham’s Riverside Ground.
WHITCHURCH II, meanwhile, emerged with six points from a losing draw at home to Bablake Old Boys II in reserve division three.
Evelyn Jones grabbed an impressive 5-32 to restrict the visitors to 172-9 before Whitchurch, who travel to county rivals Oswestry II on Saturday, were pegged back to 95-5, George Hanmer making 22.5
by Stuart Dunn