London Theatres 164-All Out (J.Pickering 4 for 10) lost to Headley XI (165-7)

The winter has seen some big changes off the field up on the heath. Headley CC is now a limited company, Philip Chapman has relinquished the Sunday XI captaincy and Grant Waller appears to have lost his razor, but the pavilion was looking as splendid as ever in the spring sunshine and Headley rolled out into the field in good spirits. Chapman retired the captaincy last year at a tearful press conference after a dramatic slump in personal form, and despite assurances in pre season that he was "hitting the ball well in the nets", and "in the best shape of his life", the new management took a strict line and decided not to include him here.

With some serious sun bathing on offer, Headley were after a brief spell in the field and some early wickets, but sadly no one had informed Alan Clarke and Alex Stone, who served up opening spells which could best be described as charitable. The Theatre's opening bat had recently played Gary Barlow in Take That the musical in the West End, so he was well able to withstand the pressure of some leg side full tosses from Alex Stone and deposited several over the road towards the Chew 'n Spew. To be fair to Stone, the leg side boundary he was attempting to protect would not have looked out of place in a back garden.

With the score threatening to go out of control at 70-0 both Clarke and Stone were put out to pasture and the ball was thrown to Headley's 'go to' man Grant Waller. Waller has thankfully lost none of his swing and accuracy over the winter, and his rakish beard may enable him to distract many batsmen this year. Certainly he had Gary Barlow in all sorts of trouble before bowling him with a trademark boomerang. At the Cock Inn end, James Midmer took over from Stone and produced a crackerjack inswinger which castled the Theatres No.3 bat. Following eventful opening overs, Midmer and Waller then dried up the runs and took a further wicket each to leave the score poised at 120-4 at the 25 over mark.

At a pivotal point in the game, stand in skipper Andy Pickering showed why there has been such a clamour for his permanent appointment with a maverick double bowling change. It would be fair to say that Josh Pickering and Gareth Noble bowl differing styles of leg spin, but with both now operating in tandom the tranquil setting of the Heath was transformed to that of a Karachi dustbowl. Having seen off the rest of Headley's attack, the Theatres opening bat may have been slightly disappointed to tread on his own stumps trying to whack Noble into downtown Leatherhead, but there could be little doubt about any of Pickerings wickets, as a succession of Theatre's lower order were beaten by ripping leg breaks. A four wicket haul was a good reward, and the five-for was only taken away by Pickering Sr, who first dropped a sitter at slip, and sniffed out a personal opportunity for the final wicket. The Theatre's closed on a respectable, if not spectacular, 164 all out

Headley's reply got off to a cracking start thanks to some typically cavalier strokeplay from Max Page. Page smashed a succession of boundaries, including an inside out drive over extra cover which carried the road, but his entertaining knock was ended on 23 when he was bowled by a shooter. Mark Hopper and Josh Pickering took the score towards 100 with some crisp shots. The game was briefly in the balance (c 100-5) when both were out in quick succession, and it it took some South African grit from Gordon Banks who moved Headley within range with a decent knock at No.6. When Banks was finally out, the game was finished off in brutal style by Grant Waller, who pulled out the long handle from its winter break and hit some huge maximums into the trees. Waller finished matters with a boundary to hand Headley a 3 wicket victory.

When interviewed about the current vacancy at the top, stand in skipper Andy Pickering said "Of course it would be a massive honour to do the job full time but I already have enough on my plate with the Chairmanship. It will be good to see a successor emerge in due course who has his own ideas to take the team forward".

On the omission of Chapman he added "Phil is now firmly in our thoughts as a batsman and we will hopefully see some of him next week and judge where he's at. He certainly remains a very important player in Headley's future"

On the game Pickering added "I thought we were in trouble at the start, before Granty stuck his hand up and bowled as we know he can. Not sure about the beard though".

Headley's next game can be seen next week up on the heath where Chapman will play his first game of the season and Page will be looking to build a big score to justify the pre season hype.