OLD WIMBLEDONIANS 138 (46.1)
beat
DULWICH 106 (45.2)
by 32 runs
Another batting collapse saw Dulwich go down to a 32-run defeat in their AJ Fordham Surrey Championship Division 2 match against Old Wimbledonians. John Lewis reports
Dulwich put their opponents in to bat, and reaped an immediate reward as skipper Jon Lodwick and Sam Ellison each took a wicket in his second over to remove both openers.
Left arm spinner Frankie Brown joined the attack as early as the eighth over, and he also took a wicket in his second over. He followed up with two more, to reduce Wimbledonians to 49-5 in the 21st over.
Javier Frost and Brad Steyn then added 45 in 12 overs for the sixth wicket before Lodwick returned to have Steyn caught behind for 25, off 37 balls.
Two more wickets for Lodwick reduced them to 106-8, but partnerships of 13 for the ninth wicket and 19 for the tenth lifted the total to 138 when last man Adam Kelly was run out trying to keep Frost on strike.
The last four wickets had added 44 runs. Frost had contributed 36 of them to finish on 73 not out, off 101 balls, while his four partners had amassed just six runs between them.
Lodwick finished with 4-29 off 13.1 overs, Brown with 3-30 off 12, while Ellison and Ahmed Khan took one each. Keeper Michael Harms held three catches.
Ollie Steele and Chris Purshouse launched the Dulwich reply carefully against accurate bowling from Frost and Kelly, with just 14 runs coming from the first nine overs.
They then accelerated to reach 46 in the 17th over when Steele was caught behind off skipper Clint McCabe for 14, having faced 63 balls.
McCabe continued to threaten, conceding just nine runs from his first nine overs, while fellow spinner Ewan Parker took the next four wickets, all given out leg before, while bowling his 14 overs straight through for just 30 runs.
Lachlan Skinner went for a single, Brown for 6, Purshouse for 35 (off 66 balls), and debutant James Schofield without scoring. Dulwich had scored just 18 runs in 14 overs while going from 46-0 to 64-5.
Matt Marfani arrested the decline in company with Harms in a stand of 27 for the sixth wicket.
With Parker bowled out, McCabe recalled his opening bowlers, and they needed just 6.2 overs to take the last five wickets and dismiss Dulwich for 106.
Marfani, who had taken 25 balls to get off the mark, finished with 23 off 52, while Harms went for 12 and Ellison, Lodwick and Alex Gledhill for a single apiece.
Dulwich had lost all ten wickets for 60 runs, with the last four wickets going down for just three runs, in marked contrast to the last four of their opponents.
Kelly finished with 3-31, Frost with 2-15, and keeper James Murphy took four catches.
This was Dulwich’s first home defeat since August 2019, and sees them fall to second place, one point behind Bank of England. Next week Dulwich visit Epsom, who have recovered from a poor start to rise to sixth in the table.
