Horley Cricket Club round-up: Firsts finish second, Robins hits astonishing century in just 34 balls for seconds

Horley elected to bat, sending out the ever-present Regan Derham, and skipper Charlie Robins, who promoted himself up the order but failed to trouble the scorers, falling to Joe Barnes (3-33). Derham scored the bulk of Horley’s runs, hitting 74 off 72 balls, but regularly lost partners to the bowling of Tom Eadon (2-32) and Amjad Hussain (5-27).

Once Derham fell at 106-5, Horley still had 21 overs to bat. Ant Puttick (20) and Matt Reid (27) shared a 43-run partnership but some good bowling mixed in with some bad shot selection down the order meant Horley were bowled out for 160 inside 38 overs.

Horley started strongly with the ball, with Guy Derham (2-28) the pick of the opening bowlers, taking his wickets in successive deliveries to leave the hosts at 7-2 after six overs. Ben Davies (2-41) and Adam Stephenson (1-21) took the next three in quick succession to make it 59-5, but John Harvey (45) and Josh Lawrence (25) steadied the ship for Alleyn on a pitch that was spinning and bouncing viciously.

Jon Barnett (2-18) broke the 44-run partnership, trapping Lawrence lbw and Harvey was removed in the very next over by Matthew Puttick (1-22).

With the score at 103-7, the game was in the balance. Barnett claimed Horley’s last wicket before Joe Colebrook (17 not out) and Joe Barnes (20 not out) saw Alleyn home.

Horley finished second in the table behind Effingham and hope to make a good account of themselves in 2023, their first year playing Championship cricket.

An astonishing innings of 103 not out from just 34 balls by Jordan Robins took Horley 2nd XI to a nine-wicket win over Warlingham 2nd XI in their last Surrey County League 2nd XI Division One match of the season.

Chasing the 135 scored by the visitors, Horley moved Robins up the order to open with Harry Grimwood and after scoring a single in the first over, Robins hit six fours in the second over and four consecutive sixes in the fourth, followed by two twos, the first of which took him to his 50 in just 12 balls.

With Warlingham having only ten players, some of whom were not very mobile in the field, they struggled to cut off Robins’ ground shots and he and veteran Trevor Stevens – up the order at three – ran four three times. The sixth over brought another 26 runs for Robins, then the flow of boundaries slowed a little, but he was still on 88 by the tenth over, which matched his previous highest score, made in 2015.

By the second ball of the 11th over Horley needed 13 to win and Robins had to score them all to reach his maiden century. Stevens blocked a couple to give him that opportunity and a four and a six from the first and third balls of the 12th over took Horley to 138-1 and Robins to 103.

Stevens finished on 12 not out from 22 balls.

In the Warlingham innings (135 all out from 43.1 overs) Horley captain Andrew Thomas had achieved career-best bowling figures of 4-24. Chris Cosham took 2-10, Andrew Reid also bagged two wickets and Luke Smith one. Alex Field took two catches and Robins and Cosham one each.

A solid bowling display by Horley 3rd XI set up a home win against Steyning 3s in the last league game of 2022 in the Sussex League Division 11 West (North).

Steyning lost the toss and were invited to bat first on a slightly damp wicket. With a strong bowling line-up, tight bowling from Sam Terry and Daniel Sired paved the way for the first-change bowlers Darren Croft (2-13) and Evan Grimwood (1-15) to make early inroads while keeping the run rate down. Steyning were on 46-2 at drinks before a clear runout by the ever-active Henry Grimwood pegged them back further.

Ryan Bunn and Naveed Sherwani stifled the batting with a great exhibition of spin and swing which opened the door for Rob Rigby (2-4) and Jack Jee (2-17) to get into the tail with some tight bowling, Jee lulling the opposition into a false sense of security with a couple of no balls before taking wickets off the last ball of successive overs.

Steyning's big-hitting Peter Smith got out shortly after reaching his 50, but his score helped them to 114-9 off their 40 overs.

Steady partnerships throughout the Horley innings saw the top five batsmen all get into double figures. Joe Wildman, with tired legs after keeping wicket for the first time this season, top-scored with 35 and Terry hit a boundary off only the second ball he faced to seal victory.

With promotion and relegation already determined before the game, there was a good spirit between the teams and this will be a fixture to look forward to next season.

All in all, Horley 3s had a very good first league season, finishing in sixth place with nine wins and seven losses and were only four points away from fourth place. Wildman, the skipper, would like to say a massive thank you to everyone who helped get the 3s into the league this season and to everyone who participated. This season has set a very good foundation for the next.