National Village Cup - We're Still Flying High!
- Graham Webb
- 5 hours ago
- 5 min read
As the heatwave of 2026 extends its grip the outfield at Blackheath may be turning an alarming shade of brown, but our prospects in the National Village Cup continue to be pink and rosy.
Despite our first-ever victory in Kent a couple of weeks ago we started the Round of 16 tie at home on Sunday 5th July as underdogs. Thanks to our amazing junior section and its production line of talent this is probably the strongest Blackheath side there has ever been, but with 4 teenagers, an oldest player of just 34 and an average age of only 25 they were up against it when our visitors, Reed CC from Hertfordshire, have won the whole competition three times in the past, twice in the last 10 years, and have a wealth of experience in their side.
Our skipper Pete Melhuish won the toss and elected to bat. The wicket was hard and inevitably dry despite a good covering of grass, so it promised to offer a little help to their seamers early on but hopefully some assistance to our two spinners as the grass began to turn to Blackheath dust later on what was a very hot and sunny afternoon.
We were soon under pressure as the Reed opening bowlers gave a wonderful demonstration of the art of medium pace seam bowling. Julien Fynn in particular found movement and delivered barely a single bad ball in his 8 overs, accounting for Matt Jackson in his first over, and then Rob Greenway and Pete Melhuish, all clean bowled as we stuttered to 40 for 3 in the 10th over. But as wickets fell at one end opening batter Luca Lacosta held firm at the other, looking in the mood to improve on the 75 he made in the previous round.
He was joined by Will Melhuish and they put on 100 for the 4th wicket before Melhuish perished for a very patiently made 52. With that solid platform, James Fortescue (17) and Tom Vickers (18) were able to help Lacosta to increase the run rate before he was agonisingly dismissed just 3 runs short of his ton, but for a magnificent 97 from 88 balls. He left the field to a big ovation from the considerable crowd, and at 205 for 6 the tense and tricky early overs had been turned into a promising total.
We finished at 229 for 9 from our 40 overs and that would often be a good score at Blackheath, but with a lightning fast high summer outfield, and with an unknown and undoubtedly powerful Reed batting line-up to come, as the crowd drifted to the pavilion to sample one of Vicky's excellent teas the match seemed to be hanging right in the balance.
At 23 years old Benji Arengo-Jones would be the junior bowler in many sides, but in this one he's a seasoned campaigner and yet again he started us off with a skilful and mature opening spell from the bottom end that yielded only 24 runs from 6 overs, taking the early wicket of Ward. His frugality gave 18 year-old Oscar Gilliam (2 for 33), by some distance the quickest bowler on either team, the licence to go for the jugular from the top end, and his selective use of the surprise short ball made what had looked like a strong and stable batting line up at the start look considerably less calm and measured as the occasional ball flew past their ears.
Wherever you play cricket home advantage is important, knowledge of the local conditions. Fielding at Blackheath is an art all of its own as you try to master the slopes, sighting the ball against the dark pines in the background, and its speedy but sometimes unpredictable path across the grassless dust scattered with the occasional pine cone or rabbit hole that appears overnight despite the very best efforts of the ground staff. As the fielding of our visitors became just a tad ragged through the afternoon so our own seemed to go from strength to strength. In particular, a key moment came with the run out of Reed's "main man" opener W.Heslam. Having made an ominously solid start to his innings he was called through from the non-striker's end for a seemingly straightforward single nudged into the covers by his partner, but was left shaking his head in disbelief as the ball came back in like lightning over the bails, fielded and thrown in a single movement by a flying, diving Pete Melhuish to be clinically finished off by keeper James Fortescue and leaving the batter short of his ground. You won't see a more professional run out in The Hundred this summer. And as for Luca Lacosta's catch at deep square leg, diving forward in front of a rapt pavilion crowd...
When Blackheath last reached these latter stages of the competition 30 years ago we relied considerably on a trio of slow bowlers to strangle the run rate in the crucial middle overs of the 40, and with 16 year-old slow left-armer Sam Behn and experienced off-spinner Sam Matthews (2 for 28) a similar pattern is emerging in this year's campaign. When Behn came on to bowl the match was still in the balance, but by the time he finished his 8 over spell with 3 for 30 it was all but over, the Reed innings in tatters at 92 for 7.
The coup de grace came in the 33rd over with still only 137 on the board as Matthews splattered the stumps of number 11 Tidey to stamp the final seal on what was a signature victory for the home side.
And so we march into the National Quarter Finals, a stage we have reached only once before in our history, 30 years ago. Our opponents and hosts will be Woolpit CC, the Suffolk champions who have already beaten the group winners of Buckinghamshire and of Essex along the way, and we'll be heading up there on Sunday 19th July. We're hoping for a large band of travelling supporters to come with us and we plan to arrange a coach or minibuses from Blackheath for what should be a fabulous day out, so if you'd like to be on it then please get in touch asap at villagecup@blackheathcricket.com
Many thanks to all who made the day possible, including but not limited to the ever-reliable Vicky in the kitchen, Sky Ellis and the team behind the bar, ground staff including Nick, Ronny and Danny Harrison and our posse of Aussie overseas players Flynn, Taz and Lily who aren't eligible for this competition but are busy behind the scenes and hopefully enjoying the journey nonetheless. Thanks also to the independent panel umpires John Dempsey and John Flatley who did what class umpires do, ran the the match firmly, smoothly and fairly but almost without being noticed. And a special thank you to Tim Chambers, probably the slowest bowler ever to play for Blackheath and definitely one of our finest scorers. Without his impeccable statisticianship match reports like this one would be impossible.
For the full scorecard, analysis, manhattans, wagon wheels, you name it...
And finally, a word for our visitors Reed CC, who were very tough opponents but behaved impeccably and were gracious in defeat. They brought with them a considerable band of supporters who bought our beer and tea and, we hope, enjoyed their afternoon in the sun at Blackheath despite the disappointment. They all helped to make what was, though we say so ourselves, the quintessential village cricket match, played at a very beautiful ground in a small village community on a perfect summer's day in a friendly and sporting spirit. The only piece of the jigsaw that didn't quite fit was the standard of the cricket... because that was anything but "village"!
All photographs with kind permission from:-
Toby Webb (drone shot) https://www.instagram.com/tobywebbphotography/
Charlie Cox
Simon Jones
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