Cricket: Dulwich draw despite another century from overseas star

Apoorv Wankhade scored his second century in successive weeks for Dulwich in their Surrey Championship Division 1 match at Spencer, but a target of 289 in 53 overs proved to be too much and the ninth wicket pair batted out the last six overs to secure a losing draw, writes John Lewis.

Spencer won the toss and chose to bat but got off to a slow start against Jon Lodwick and Jacob Emler, who both beat the bat frequently.

Emler took the first wicket in his second over in an excellent opening spell of 1-16 off seven overs but Lodwick was unlucky to go wicketless in bowling 10 overs for 30.

Wankhade took the second wicket in his first over with the score on 42 in the 16th, but the change bowlers could not impose the same restraint.

Archie MacPherson joined opener Will De Cani in adding 60 in 12.3 overs for the third wicket before Ahmed Khan had him lbw for 21.

De Kani and Freddie Horler added 55 in 12 overs for the fourth wicket before Khan had De Cani caught on the boundary for 82, off 112 balls, to make it 157-4 after 39 overs.

But the score now progressed rapidly as Horler made 56 off 69 balls, David Mansfield 18 off 24, Ollie Bocking 42 off 39 and skipper Gus Grant 35 not out off 44.

Lodwick returned to take the wickets of Horler and Mansfield in his second spell and finish with 2-66 off 17 overs, Khan had 2-78 off 15, while Emler finished with 1-26 off 10 overs. Grant declared on 288-8 after 63 overs, leaving Dulwich 57 overs to bat.

Grant had surmised that spin would be more effective than pace and opened with himself at one end and his quick bowlers at the other.

His assumption was proved correct as he conceded just nine runs off his first six overs while two pace bowlers went for 26 between them off five.

This prompted him to bring on slow left-armer Max Hunt and the pair bowled in tandem for the next 21 overs during which they conceded 86 runs and took the first four wickets.

Openers Ahmed Khan and James Schofield added 42 in 12 overs for the first wicket before Khan fell for 17 off 35 balls. This brought in Wankhade who dominated the scoring for the rest of the innings while wickets fell steadily at the other end.

Schofield helped him add 26 for the second wicket before falling for 31, made off 53 balls.

Skipper Chris Purshouse went without scoring in the next over to make it 69-3 after 19.

Moin Khan made five out of 26 for the fourth wicket and Kaif Ramzan 13 out of 39 for the fifth. This took the score to 134-5 after 34 overs, by which time Wankhade was already on 65.

Tom Bishop made 14 out of a stand of 47, the highest of the innings, for the sixth wicket, and Robbie Keaton also made 14 out of 25 for the seventh.

Lodwick had contributed two to a stand of 16 for the eighth when Wankhade fell for 118, made off 106 balls.

This was a much more belligerent knock than last week, containing only four fours, but including 10 sixes, three of which had come off one Grant over.

With 67 runs still required off 6.4 overs, victory was now beyond their reach.

Lodwick and Emler dropped anchor and played out six consecutive maidens to finish on 223-8 and secure the losing draw.

Grant and Hunt had taken all eight wickets, with the skipper finishing on 5-96 off 24 overs, and Hunt 3-58 off 18.

Dulwich took six points from this game and slipped one place to fourth in the table.

This weekend they return home to play league leaders Valley End.