Arctic Foxes claim draw at Swarkestone
Thu 28 Apr 2016
REPORT | By Pete Johnson
We arrived at ‘Swarkestone by Siberia’ to be greeted by another sunny yet bitingly cold morning. The by now regulation snow showers had been forecast for the afternoon.
A colony of penguins had heard about the weather we were experiencing, and assembled at the ground positioning themselves in the area of deep mid-wicket boundary where they were absolutely relishing the conditions.
Tom Wells and his Arctic Foxes took to the field with Derbyshire on 112-2 trailing by 61 runs. Alex Hughes started on 28* and Shiv Thakor 2*. Tom Wells and James Sykes opened the attack for County, and Sykes, bowling from the Village End, had Hughes (35) well caught by Atif Sheikh running round from long off.
Harvey Hosein joined Thakor, and perished in the next over when he was caught at second slip by Harry Dearden off Tom Wells.
Immediately after this wicket had fallen the umpires took the players from the field, as a severe hail storm was about to deposit its contents on the ground.
Only 4.5 overs had been bowled in the 20 minutes play, Derbyshire being on 122-4. Play being suspended at 11.20am. After a lengthy stoppage lunch was taken at 12.30pm. The umpires inspected at 1.00pm, and play would resume at 1.25pm, with 68.1 overs remaining.
Only 16 further overs in the day were possible. In that time Knight(27) went lbw to Sykes, and Thakor moved to his half century (3x4, 2x6, 74b). Thakor progressed to his 50 from the final ball of the day. The Umpires abandoned the match at 2.32pm with further storm clouds looming. Derbyshire closing on 210-5, Thakor 50*, Cork 10*.
Our Second XI Coach Pierre De Bruyn has now experience of the English weather. I have told him to wait until it gets really cold.
