A win to retain the Mark Harris Trophy wraps up a highly successful 2026 season. A huge thanks to Woody for pulling the team together for that final match. I am incredibly grateful to everyone who made themselves available for games this year. Special thanks to Uma, my trusted wingman, and everyone else who helped get our teams out, with Karthik being our star recruiter this season! Finally, thank you to Bob for preparing the wickets during a challenging year, and to JH for spending countless hours watering and rolling the wickets.

Match Report

Having been agreed that Chesham Bois would bat first, the Bois front loaded the attack with Gaurav and Seb striding to the crease. Gaurav holing out to a full toss on 12 put a slight dent in that plan but Uma(69) and Seb then put on a 150 run partnership having lost Paul for 12 in the intervening period. Alex(4), Vaibhav(8) partnered Seb until he finally nicked one behind for a memorable 127 in the 33rd of 35 overs. Peter finished 10 not out as Akshay was caught going for another boundary off the last ball for 8. 276 for 7 off 35 overs, a very challenging total.

Not deterred by the imposing total, Woody’s XI set off at pace and were up with the scoring rate early in the innings. Samar(5-1-28-2) and Hrian(4.3-1-23-1) had the dubious honour of opening the attack and did take a couple of wickets. Seb(2-1-5-0) had a couple of overs as Peter(7-2-56-2) settled in at the other end. Vaibhav(5-0-35-1) took a wicket in his spell and was followed by a brief blast from Uma(3-0-19-2) who accounted for another couple of wickets. Akshay(2-0-11-0) got a couple of overs in as Gaurav(1-0-4-1) bowled his only over. The returning Hrian then mopped up the innings in the 30th over leaving Woody’s XI on 177 all out.

On any other day 177 off 30 would be a good total but Seb’s man of the match 127 made their task a little out of reach on the day. Another good game of cricket and thanks to everyone who took part and Shona once again for the wonderful teas between the innings.