As usual I steeled myself ready for what I anticipated as another tough season with the 3rd Eleven,
with our patchy availability and inconsistent team selection. ln previous years we have gone into
games with less than the full quota of players and even when we did, the average age was about I5
for the team!!!!! With all that said we had a much better year for availability and we only went into
one game with less than eleven players.

We were able to call on the fit again (well as fit as he could ever be! !) Adrian Waldock, whose
wisdom, knowledge and tactical nous had been missing over the last year and teamed with the born
again all rounder Malcolm Cammack we had enough experience for 10 c1ubs!!!! We also had a
decent turn out from the colt section with a few additions from the second eleven team of last year
and a couple of new faces. Over the course of the season we used 33 players which was an
improvement on the year before!!
On the results front we made some progress on last year which probably wasn’t that hard to
do given that we lost 12 of our matches in 2008. The 2009 season saw us win 2, lose 7 and play out
for 5 losing draws in the games we played. The massive plus for us as a team was turning 5 of the
previous seasons loses into losing draws with some gritty rearguard batting, something which the
team had lacked for many a year. Every player from 1 to 1 1 at some point chipped in with the bat
over the course of the campaign and we really frustrated many a team. We finished the year second
from bottom (again) and scored 91 points from 14 matches (87pts from I6 in 2008).
Our victories came against Frimley and Chobham, both of which could have gone either way!
The Frimley match was played in great spirit by both teams in the bottom of the table clash. With
the Vandals bowling first we soon made great inroads mainly thanks to the new ball bowling of
Jaime Pompei (3-24) who restricted the hosts. This was backed up by tidy spells by the youngsters:
Camran ‘Badger’ Ahmed and Jordan ‘Haggis’ Collins who both picked up a wicket each. The wily
Malcolm Cammack bowled exceptionally well and economically and should have had a few wickets
himself. He would have had to, had it not been for the ‘Magoo’ who then trundled on and proceeded
to dispatch the Frimley tail with some cunning rank full tosses leaving Bruce finishing with figures
of 3 for 15 in 5 overs! Having bowled out Frimley for 107 we ensured in true Vandals style that we
would make it hard for ourselves collapsing to 36 for 5. Cue Haseeb Rahman and Malcolm
Cammack who steadied the ship with an unbeaten partnership of 72, Haseeb ending 39* and
Malcolm ending 25*.
The Chobham game was certainly a lot more demanding with the dominance changing hands
on many occasions. Having been put into bat by our guests we made a steady start with Adrian
Waldock and myself (with hangover!) putting on 64 for the first wicket. As with our age old club
tradition, all the hard work was soon wasted with us losing another 4 quick wickets leaving us at
98-5. However, with some great lower order batting from the colts and a somewhat de-hydrated
innings from myself (scoring 62) we managed to get up to 181-8 in 5 1 .5overs.
In reply we took an early wicket leaving Chobham 6-1, this joy was to be short lived as the
Chobham batsman began to dominate, and a great 68 from C Fidge really had us against the ropes.
At this stage I was wondering where to turn to next with most of the bowlers getting carted around
the park it was then I remembered that we had a young lad making his debut for the Vandals, Gokul
Sukumar. With his 3rd ball he bowled the destructive C Fidge and went on to claim a match winning
4- 14 in 10 overs! It wasn’t as straightforward as that though, Chobham only needed 9 runs from the
last over with 1 wicket remaining in desperation I turned to Malcolm Cammack (only joking Mal).
With his second ball of the over he removed the last man (D Hartney) who in the previous over
looked like he would have won it for them hitting a couple of boundaries to get them to within
touching distance. Bruce Magill also picked up 3 wickets to help us win the tie. The match was
enthralling from start to finish and I would like to thank the Chobham skipper and team for being
very sporting and making it a great game of cricket.
In terms of key achievements they are as follows: Batting- AAyres 269 runs @ I9.21 average,
A Waldock 152 @ 15.2, M Cammack l25@ 17.86, H Rahman 124 @ 20.67 (keep playing for your
average Haseebll), A Sultan 123 @ 15.38. Only 5 batsmen managed to get over 100 runs. For the
bowling that looked as follows: LConnaughton 16 wickets @ 16.13 average,A Pollard 15 @ 20.27,
B Magill 15 @ 17.8 and A Sultan 10 @ 16.7. Unfortunately we won’t win any awards for fielding;
it`s getting hard to try and find places to hide some of our less mobile fielders and this normally
results in us having a 5 man slip cordon. Nevertheless, we did manage to hold on to a fair few
catches in the end, despite the early season fumbles.

Well done to everyone who contributed, in particular Liam Connaughton who for a 15 year old
opened the bowling brilliantly. Tony Pollard ably assisted with the new ball duties. Amaad when
he played contributed in every game with the bat or with ball; he gets the Malcolm Cammack All-
rounder of the year award this season!! The latter also chipped in with runs and wickets including
a brilliant 5/23 vs. Old Pauline’s. Adrian Waldock gave us stability at the top of the innings with
the bat and managed to improve his strike rate to l0. Our outgoing Chairman scored a great 50
against Ripley which was fitting as it was also his 50th birthday too! Bruce Magill as usual popped
up and picked up regular wickets here and there. Haseeb Rahman was probably the most improved
player of the year and started to get some good starts with the bat.
Now for the thank you’s! A big thanks to the oppositions who all kept things in the spirit of
the game and a well done to those who got promoted. A massive thanks to all the colts (Jordan,
Maroof, Connor, Sam, Dale, Camran, Liam, Luke, Charlie, Kash and Sam sorry if I missed anyone)
who helped out and assisted me in assembling a squad every week. A big thanks to all the part time
players and new players who played their part last season. A thank you should be said to the
experienced players like Malcolm and Adrian who always offer advice and support in running the
team! Last but not least an enormous thanks to Emma who scores for us and who also taxis a lot of
the colts around. Thanks to all involved (including the other skippers for not always nicking all my
players), hopefully 2010 will be another improvement for the 3rd XI.