Devon v Somerset Seaton C.C. 4th August 2003

Scorecard

A strange but most enjoyable day, the previous night the calculator had been consulted on run rates, overs and so on, the author was accused of being pessimistic by the scorer but she still duly completed the calculations. We worked out how many runs were needed the keep us ahead on run rate should we loose! Oh yea of little faith - the Devon side completed a memorable victory where apart from a decent second wicket partnership of 98 between the contracted pair Matt Wood and Arul Suppiah Devon were amazingly in control for most of the match. The choice of date had resulted in Somerset losing two players, Edwards and Parsons, to England and obviously the senior Devon side had first option on three - Lye, Foan and Dawson so honours were about even on paper, Somerset subsequently drafted in their 2002 batting discovery, Devonian Matt Wood, in place of Andrews, our luck with the toss continued as Somerset won it and batted. The wonderfully talented Wood, who had virtually scored a thousand runs the previous season opened, despite the fact that the scorer has always enjoyed his batting a vital game at Seaton did not seem one of the more appropriate occasions. Indeed his magnificent 55 on the same ground against Warwickshire in 1997 came back into the mind. One of the many early displays of his immense talent. Sadly from a Devon, if not the scorers viewpoint Wood batted through the Somerset innings being involved in a second wicket 98 run partnership off 103 balls with Seaton’s Suppiah (52) and a 71 ball 53 run partnership with the visitors skipper Tom Webley (31). Webley along with Hildreth (8) and Timms (0) has taken hundreds off the Devon attack during recent seasons so it was pleasing that Somerset had scored only 240 at the end of their allocation. Wood had scored his 103 off only 123 balls and he batted the entire 164 minutes. The home sides bowling rate was excellent with the miserly Andy Procter setting the pace. The county captain had guaranteed that he would not go for more than four an over and he duly obliged. A key phase of the innings was when he was bowling in tandem with Steve Edmonds when from the 28th over to the 47th the score advanced from 139 to only 221. For the record Timms was the first to go caught by Anning at slip; Suppiah was trapped in front by Procter’s sixth delivery. Hildreth was brilliantly caught by the diving Holman at square leg and Theedom held an excellent two handed catch at mid on to remove Webley who was starting to accelerate.

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