The Brown Caps suffered a defeat at the hands of Yorkshire Carnegie in the opening NatWest Pro40 match at Guildford. Chris Schofield’s electric display with the bat was the only highlight in a disappointing run chase by the home side that led to an 11 run loss. Three wickets from Usman Afzaal helped the Brown Caps to reduce Carnegie to 230 off their 40 overs, but the home side failed to get going at all with the bat and stumbled to a second loss in two days at Guildford.

Pedro Collins and Jade Dernbach bowled very well in the first 10 overs of the Carnegie innings to restrict the away side to 64, no mean feat on the high scoring Guildford ground. Backed up by some excellent ground fielding on the fast outfield, Collins bowled with great control and the left-armer picked up the first wicket when he got Jacques Rudolph caught behind for 20. Dernbach then switched to the Pavilion end to remove Andrew Gale, bowled with a straight full ball for 44. Dernbach was rather fortunate to collect the wicket of Rana Naved. The Carnegie pinch-hitter whipped a ball off his stumps to a diving Usman Afzaal at short-fine leg and hung on to leave the visitors 80 for three. The spinners came on and proceeded to pick up wickets at regular intervals. Matthew Spriegel bowled a perfect doosra to Gerard Brophy and had him stumped by Jonathan Batty for six.

Adam Lyth and Anthony McGrath played patiently and knocked the singles around as the combined spin attack of Spriegel, Chris Schofield and Usman were hard to score off. With boundaries hard to come by and with the overs ticking along the Yorkshire batsman then fell victim to the long straight boundaries at Guildford. Lyth was next to go, lifting Usman to long-off for 28. Then McGrath hit Usman straight to Jason Roy at long-off for 37. Next was Tim Bresnan, who hit Usman high to long-on, Spriegel took the catch and Usman claimed his third wicket. Usman finished with 3 for 43 and the Brown Caps were containing the opposition.

A late partnership of 59 between Adil Rashid and Richard Pyrah gave Carnegie a fighting chance, but it was a below par score at Guildford. The pair took their time a managed to hit the odd boundary as Dernbach came back and gave a few loose balls to hit. The Brown Caps were excellent in the field and produced a display that gave the home side the edge at the half-way stage.

The Brown Caps made a poor start to their run chase. Yorkshire bowled some tight opening overs and both the Brown Cap opening batsmen gave their wickets away. Scott Newman flashed hard at a wide ball from Bresnan and was caught at slip for 5. James Benning’s frustration of not scoring freely got to him, he played across the line and lobbed the ball back to bowler Bresnan. In between this, Mark Ramprakash was LBW to Rana Naved for one, as the Brown Caps fell to 25 for three.

Usman and Chris Jordan came together and tried to rebuild the innings and they looked to be doing just that. The pair added 65 for the fourth wicket, but it turned out to be at a slow rate as the Carnegie spinners slowed them down. The rate was ever increasing and the challenge was becoming too great for the Brown Caps. After Usman fell to Rashid for 41, it was Schofield who tried to inject some impetus.

Schofield did the right job and tried to keep the home side in the match, he played with skill and imagination to go to 50 off just 38 balls. Jordan went LBW to Gough for 38 and the target was down to 94 off the last 10 overs. Carnegie rotated their attack well and although Jonathan Batty hit a quick 24, when Schofield departed for 58 it was all over.
Some late sixes from Dernbach made the match look closer than it was after another inept run chase from the Brown Caps. The Surrey outfit have now only won five of their 19 one day games this season and need to find some solutions to find a win.

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