Spent a very enjoyable day yesterday at Grace Road, Leicester watching the second day (that ultimately turned out to be the last day) of Essex v Leicestershire in the County Championship 2nd Division.
Memorable moments included 134 from James Foster. Essex were looking to consolidate a position of strength with the possibility of promotion to the first division next year. Bopara and Foster batted sensibly for over an hour unit Bopara got himself out and then Foster had to bat with an ever decreasing tail as everyone seemed to find a different way to get out, apart from David Master who hung around long enough to see Foster to his ton and share in a 98 run partnership for the eighth wicket. Essex finally all out mid afternoon with local supporters suggesting the game may be over very soon! How right they were!
Now the highlight of the game. Monty Panesar had been totally anonymous during the game, not bowling in the first innings and two schoolboy errors in the field both resulting in 4’s. However just when Leicester seemed to be building an innings second time round Monty was brought into the attack and with his first ball he trapped Smith LBW and embarked on the best celebration I have ever seen. Firstly a great whoop and leap in the air, arms and legs akimbo and then he set off to the other end via the square leg boundary, leaping about like a whirling dervish until finally caught and engulfed under his teammates. His antics were absolutely brilliant and totally appreciated by all. From that point Leicester fell apart losing their last 6 wickets for three runs. “A bit of a collapse in the last minutes of the game”, rather copied by our beloved U’s a few hours later.
A win for Essex then and still an outside possibility of promotion (not a word you hear often on this board)
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