Champions!

Our U15 cricket team finished their superb season in style with a resounding victory over Baines School in the final of the Fylde & Wyre Cup.

The Poulton school won the toss and put Andrew Walkden's team into bat first. This looked like a good decision after Harrison Kenworthy was caught off Fielding's bowling in the very first over. Oliver McPheely and Andrew Walkden then turned the tables on their opponents as they enjoyed a long and impressive 77 run partnership, hitting boundaries to all corners of the Arnold School field. McPheely has blossomed into a very competent and mature opening batsman and he retired once more on 35 not out with the score on 63-1 from nine overs. Walkden soon followed on 36 not out, as he finished just short of 350 runs in what has been a remarkable season for him.

Louis Mottley and Charles Laycock continued the previous pair's good work and the U15s were on 74-1 from the first ten overs. Mottley and Laycock hit some very big shots and in five overs they added 52 runs to catapult Arnold to 126-1 with five overs left. Mottley was eventually run out for a superb 34 and Laycock finished not out on 25 as the U15s finished on a hefty 172-4.

Baines now needed over eight runs an over if they were to win the match but Mottley and Walkden put them under all sorts of early pressure. It wasn't long before 8-0 became 11-3 as Mottley struck twice and Walkden had a nice caught and bowled. Walkden then struck again and Baines found themselves on 24-4 from just seven overs. Townsend batted brillantly with Fielding and, although Baines could never quite keep up with the run-rate, this pair enjoyed a 62 run partnership over twelve overs. Not until Anthony Withington came on for the final over did Arnold take any more wickets. In fact Withington was on a hat-trick at one stage and Baines finished their innings on 93-6 as Arnold won by 76 runs.

The U15s became team of the year for 2010 with eight wins from their ten matches. This is a remarkable turn of events as they did not win one match in the whole of 2009 and they must all be congratulated for the amount of hard work they have put into this season.

To see a photo gallery of the match, please click 'read more' below.

Posted by: M L Evans
Date: Friday 02/07/2010