Lady Llamas take the Premiership

An important fixture for both teams at Park Lane on Sunday as the Lady Llamas looked to close out their table topping campaign with a win to clinch the title against a Guildford team needing a win to avoid the drop. Skipper Jess Whitcher called correctly and, sportingly, invited the 8 woman visitors to bat on a road with a lightning fast outfield to boot. Guildford opened with Liz Jurczenko returning to the ground where she scored an unbeaten 133 in a record breaking 250 stand with Louise Worsfold last season. Liz clearly loves Llamaland because, after sharing a breezy opening partnership of 66 with Lyanna Farooqi, she added a further 82 with skipper Felicity Bennett before departing caught behind by ‘keeper Vicki Howard for 77 from 68 balls to the bowling of Jess Whitcher. It was a welcome breakthrough too because, with the exception of Lucy Harris (3-2-4-0), who bowled an amazing 17 consecutive dots before conceding 4 from her last ball, Priory’s quicker bowlers struggled to keep the Guildford pair tied down. So Jess decided to take the pace off turning to Izzy Wall (6-0-31-0), Georgia Waine (3-0-24-1) and Evie Spreadbury (5-0-29-1). Amy Gordon also shunned her long run and helped to restore order with a tidy spell of 7-0-27-0. But, with Jurczenko back in the hutch, the Llamas had opened up an end and wickets began to fall at regular intervals. Bennett was fifth out, lbw to the impressive seam bowling of u14 Naomi Saunders shortly after completing her second half century this season against Reigate. Guildford managed to use their full allocation of 35 overs finishing on 197-6 - a total which included a whopping 37 extras including 17 wides and 7 no balls.

After a splendid tea courtesy of Vicky’s Mum, Priory set about chasing with openers Vicki Howard and Lucy Harris. Lucy wasted no time racing to 23 off 15 balls including 5 boundaries before smashing Evie Elstone to Grace Perkins at cover who accepted her second catch off Lucy this summer having completed a similar dismissal at Woodbridge Road back in June when Lucy scored exactly 100 more than on this occasion against the same opposition. Vicki was then joined by Amy Gordon who immediately picked up where Lucy left off while Vicky skilfully gave her as much of the strike as possible. Amy was in no mood to waste the opportunity to cash in against a side with just six outfielders and as she set about the Guildford attack with gusto. After Vicki’s departure - coming down the track to a moon ball from Grace Perkins which cannoned off her pads into the stumps - Amy was joined by the captain. The race was then on to see whether Jess could reach a half century before Amy could reach three figures. And could both of them get their respective milestones before the target was reached? Amy completed her ton off 61 balls including 20 fours. A fine knock from Amy who had turned down an opportunity to be with the South East Stars to play for Reigate instead. But Jess was still three short of her personal goal with just 2 required for victory so she turned down two singles in the hope of finishing the game with a boundary. Sadly Guildford’s diminutive spinner Elodie Lye had other ideas and bowled the Lady Llamas skipper for 47 but not before Jess had earlier hit the shot of the day with a towering six into the sight screen at the pavilion end. Kate Mehmood came in to replace her and hit the winning runs as the Lady Llamas won with 14 overs to spare by 7 wickets and with that triumph became SWCL Premiership Champions of 2022. They celebrated with pizza and a kick about on the outfield before retiring to the bar for karaoke. Well played ladies!