On a hot sunny afternoon, Grace's took on Pacific CC after receiving the news that our President Russell Grant had been taken ill. With this in mind, we fought back against Pacific CC, who had dominated our bowling. Playing on an artificial wicket our bowlers were hit high wide and handsome all over the ground, with two Pacific players scoring unbeaten centuries. Grace's had to field out of their skins just to keep the score down to a competitive target, eventually being set 262 to win.
With Camberwell smacking his first 24 deliveries for 23, the chase was on, as Mendis (75) and Rishafi (89) clubbed Grace's to within striking distance of Pacific's mammoth score. Mendis in particular took complete control, hitting two enormous sixes before he was out hooking to the longest boundary. Superb cricket. Rishafi steadied the ship with a patient innings, hitting all loose balls to the boundary in a carefully crafted display. Scott carefully reached 18 with some great defence, Ross was all too brief for his 6 runs, whilst skipper Bielby cracked the 15 runs he needed to reach his career total of 2,000 runs for the club - well done Skip!
Close to our target, Pacific pulled on the brakes with some short-pitched bowling, one of which hit our player Fawaz right in the face - bravely he carried on. Rishafi fell trying to win the game with a glorious four, caught on the boundary and the last ball was left for Silva to block out to leave the game tied. What a game. Well done again to all, especially for the fielding.