Blackheath Surrey Slam Winners 2025!

Many congratulations to Tom Vickers and his T20 team who emerged victorious from the Surrey Slam Finals Day yesterday at Valley End, following 2 nail-biting matches against tough opposition.

After well over 100 teams from all over Surrey started the competition, just 4 remained yesterday.  In the first semi-final Blackheath took on Woodmansterne CC, who having won the toss posted 153 all out from their 20 overs, with Jake Gordon contributing a quickfire 43.  There were 2 wickets each for Oscar Gilliam, Danny Harrison and Tom Vickers, whilst spinners Sam Behn and Tom McClean were tight as ever, and some sharp fielding led to no fewer than 3 run outs. 

In reply, Tom Vickers and Rob Greenway got us off to a fast start, and Ben Bushell continued the momentum, top scoring with 30.  Will Melhuish missed out, but there were valuable contributions from Freddie Alexander and Charlie and Ozzy Rooken-Smith (the latter hitting 2 sixes in one over from Adnan Shah).  After a couple of quick wickets, Tom McClean and Oscar Gilliam then steadied the ship until we needed just 4 from the last over – which were duly achieved with 3 balls to spare.

And so to the final, where we took on last year’s winners, Kempton CC.  Like Woodmansterne, Kempton won the toss and elected to bat, but got off to the worst possible start, with Oscar Gilliam picking up 2 wickets in the first over.  Thereafter, regular wickets kept the run rate under control until Gurjeet Singh and Bhavesh Gentilal came together with the total on 84, adding nearly 60 for the seventh wicket.  After Gentilal was finally caught by Sam Behn off Tom McClean, Singh looked to be heading to a well-deserved 50.  However, he ran out of partners, with Tom Vickers removing numbers 10 and 11 in the final over, bringing a slightly early end to the innings on a total of 157.  Wickets were shared around, with Oscar Gilliam taking 3 and Sam Behn conceding just 20 runs from his 4 overs.

As in the semi-final, our formidable opening partnership of Tom Vickers and Rob Greenway gave us a tremendous start in reply, with some ferocious hitting taking us to 85 by the eighth over, before Vickers was caught off Singh for 32.  Rob Greenway fell in the next over for 44 off just 27 balls, and Ben Bushell followed not long afterwards.  Will Melhuish and Freddie Alexander added 25 with some rapid running between the wickets, but there was then a middle order collapse as Freddie, Will, the Rooken-Smith brothers and Oscar all departed in quick succession, leaving us precariously poised on 122 for 8 with 36 still needed. 

By this point nerves were jangling all round the ground, but fortunately in Tom McClean and Sam Behn we had the coolest customers in town.  They defended when necessary and picked off singles and boundaries when they could, until (as in the previous match) we needed just 4 from the final over.  After 2 dot balls, the third delivery was dispatched to the boundary by Tom, and the cup was ours!

To win a major county-wide competition like the Surrey Slam is on any view a tremendous achievement for a club like Blackheath, but more impressive still was the way we did it.  Of our team on Finals Day, no fewer than nine came up through our junior section, five were teenagers and four were aged 17 or younger.  The future is bright indeed!

Full scorecards from the 2 matches can be found at the links below:

Semi-final: Woodmansterne v Blackheath

Final: Kempton v Blackheath