HKCC dominate Hancock Shield match against KCC

Hancock Shield: Kowloon Cricket Club (185 all out and 289-6) drew with Hong Kong Cricket Club (321-9 and 317-1) | Full Scorecard

Mark Eames' century allowed HKCC to build an impressive first innings score © HKCA

Restored to its rightful status as a two-day game, even if shorn of some of the bigger names from each club, this year's Hancock Shield failed to produce on only one level: a clear-cut result. Played on an excellent straw-coloured pitch prepared by curator Ricky Aitken, which offered a little help to the seam bowler who bowled straight, while providing bounce as true and predictable as an Aaron Steward misfield, a total of 1112 runs were scored in 199.3 overs - an average of 5.57 runs per over, or very nearly a run a ball. Even on such a small ground, this represented a run-rate on an England Ashes-winning scale.

Though some might argue that the average would have been significantly lower if all Naeem Ashraf's No balls were discounted, it would, on the other hand, have been higher still if veteran Kowloon wicketkeeper Ray Brewster had been adjudicating in place of umpires Swift and Tyrwhitt-Drake. The less strict interpretation of legside Wides adopted for this match - a match which now perhaps alone of all games in Hong Kong is a throwback to the days of yore: blazers, proper cricket caps, declarations and 20 overs bowled each hour (in spirit, if not in actuality) - not only encouraged the bowlers to display their full repertoire (who will forget Luke Rewega's hostile spells with the new ball or Ian Duncombe's surprise use of the straight one?), but also had the Veteran beseeching the umpires to call Wide against his own bowlers, as yet another call of 4 Byes was notched against his name by scorers Jenny Lethbridge and Graeme Stillwell.

Winning the toss on a warm day with a swirling breeze - with only a slight prospect of rain for the weekend - Afzaal Haider surprisingly chose to field. Although his counterpart Mark Fuzes went early, two more Marks (Kratzmann and Eames) accumulated steadily, as the opening pair of Ashraf and Haider failed to make best use of the early life in the pitch, struggling with their line against the two left-handers. Problems mounted for KCC with the dismissal of Kratzmann, as it brought to the wicket not another Mark, but another left-hander, and a more belligerent one, Adam Gunthorpe.

Playing his penultimate game before a snowboarding sabbatical in the Canadian Rockies, the Big Easy was quickly into his stride, finding the gaps in the field, even if not always the gap he was looking for. At the other end, Steads was playing one of the knocks of the season, giving one chance in the gully, where Ashraf was caught out by the lack of pace on the ball. (The former Pakistan one-day international obviously hasn't played against Eamesie as much as the rest of us.) The dismissal of Gunners for 58 brought yet another left-hander to the crease, in the shape (and quite an impressive shape it is too) of Shandy, the only Hobbit to be have played the game at representative level. The Halfling made 26 before the lure of the simple life called him back to the home comforts of his barrow and a yard of ale.

At the end of their allotted 60 overs, HKCC had amassed 321-9, with Haider (4-89 off 14 overs) and Imran Farcy (3-69 off 15 overs) the pick of the bowlers. In reply, KCC got off to a flyer, with Rohan Boghani's watchfulness providing the foil to Dyutesh Chaudhuri's expansive driving. When Chaudhuri perished for 21, he passed on the baton to Nigel Shroff, who mixed aggression with control to move onto 41 the ball before the drinks' break. Then, inexplicably, he dobbed a catch to Sahmi Mehta at mid wicket off the bowling of Mal Costain. In the final session, as the light began to fade, as it is wont to do in Hong Kong in mid-November, KCC lost all chance of the winning the match, as a combination of a bizarre batting order and tight bowling by the spinners, Costain and Fuzes, resulted in a collapse as the visitors' confidence visibly ebbed away. From plenty for 1, they had crashed to 176-5 when time was called 5 overs early at 5.23pm - the consequence of their own slow over rate earlier in the day.

Resuming on Sunday morning, man of the match Brett Morley made full use of the conditions, and demonstrated the benefits of bowling straight with just enough movement to catch the edge. Catch it he did, with keeper Kratzmann and Fuzes's taking good catches in the slip cordon. Morley finished with 5-36, as KCC lost their last five wickets for just 11 runs to finish 136 runs in arrears off just 41.3 overs.

Since they had been bowled out in fewer than their first innings allotment of 60 overs, the balance of the overs unbowled was carried forward for each team to share in the second innings, meaning instead of 40, they would each be facing 49 overs. As holders needing just a draw to retain the Shield, HKCC set out to bat their opponents out of the game. A monumental 255-run partnership for the second wicket speaks more eloquently than words to the success of that strategy. As the sun shone, the two left-handers made hay, while demonstrating to the young KCC players how to combine aggression with application, concentration and shot selection. After Fuzes had gone for a fluent 44, Gunthorpe (117*) and Kratzmann (102*) set about the bowling in their contrasting styles, Gunners' bludgeoning pulls and straight drives alternating with Kratzmann's cover drives and square cuts. Cunning rotation of the strike enabled both batsmen to reach their centuries, and left KCC playing for pride as they chased a mammoth 454 for victory off 49 overs, an asking rate of more than 9 an over.

That pride was restored to some degree, as batting in a more appropriate order, Boghani (with a second innings 63 to go with his first innings 64), Amjad Mahmood (56) and Ashraf (96) ensured that the visitors held on for a draw. Once again, Morley was the best bowler, taking 3-28 to give him match figures of 8-64. Ashraf showed what a force he can be with the bat, sending one of his sixes soaring over the ever-expanding defences rising up like Orthanc around the ground - much to Shandy's consternation, as he patrolled the area and engaged those ranging on the boundary in conversation, pausing occasionally to check if the ball was coming his way. It was a mug's game bowling to the left-hander from the Wong Nai Chung Gap Road end, but it couldn't have happened to a nicer mug than Mal Costain. Whether that's how the Melbournite viewed it, as he saw his mixture of leg breaks, googlies, flippers, sliders, top-spinners, back-spinners and zooters - and even the occasional doosra - all end up as wrong-uns is anyone's guess.