Gower and Mellor slam tons in crushing victory
Highgate Woods, 8/7/2004
Strongroom J.Gower won by 145 runs
Strongroom J.Gower: 267-1 (M.Mellor 130*, J.Gower 102*)
Strongroom Proctor: 122 all out
View the Scorecard
The second match in the now epic Gower v Ray series took place on a scorching hot August afternoon at Highgate Woods. The previous encounter saw David Gower’s team humiliated by Simon Ray’s squad, but today’s game told a very different story.
Jon Gower stepped in to skipper in his older brother’s absence, and elected to bat first. Mellor and McLellan opened for Strongroom Gower, and scored briskly on a placid surface, and it took a fine off-cutter from a 40% fit Simon Ray to disturb Stu Mac’s stumps with score 33-1. J Gower came in to partner an increasingly aggressive Mellor, and in very little time boundaries were being struck at an alarming rate. Mellor characteristically waited for the over pitched ball before driving it with great power, or swivelled back to pull long-hops to the onside, on numerous occasions. J Gower took a while to find his touch, but then began to open up, including dead straight sixes over the sightscreens at each end. Ray, Proctor, Som and R Woolhouse all bowled with intent, but a benign pitch, aggressive batting and sloppy fielding conspired against them. This rampant pair racked up an unbeaten stand of 234 in 28 overs, Mellor scoring 130* and Gower 102*, in a total of 267-1 off 35 overs. Also of note was the final over bowled to Gower, who started it on 76*. The next 6 balls produced 26 runs (4-6-4-6-4-2) to both bring up his ton and complete their huge total.
A service station lunch was hastily consumed and R Woolhouse and JB set out, with bellies full of scotch eggs and sausage rolls, to overhaul this intimidating total. Both batsmen started with furious strokeplay, R Woolhouse in particular smashing the bowling of Dan and Matty for several boundaries. However, angry batting always produces chances, and soon both batsmen were back in the tiny scorers shed, as Dan and Matty began to settle into some rhythm. The scoring rate was high, at around 9 an over, but Strongroom Ray kept losing wickets as their batsmen played risky shots in a bid to eat into the target. Only Skipper Ray, batting with a damaged arm, showed how to bat sensibly, producing some sublime boundaries before skewing an on-drive which completed his team’s innings at 122 all out.
The eventual victory margin of 145 runs avenged Team Gower’s previous defeat, and equally pleasing was Mark Mellor’s 130* - in response to his golden duck in that game!
Written By: Simon Ray
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