Backing it up

Kyle Quartermaine
It’s fair to say Narberth’s Kyle Quartermaine is not a big fan of Carew.

 Anyone who follows his Twitter feed can attest to that.

A couple of weeks ago he was lambasting them on the social media platform calling them all of the names under the sun following an ill-tempered league fixture and this week, he backs it up with a scintillating performance with the bat to help his team beat the Rooks in the Harrison-Allen cup.

David Lovell used to say ‘sledge me if you’re good enough’ and after those tweets (which led to County Chairman Paul Webb tweeting ‘easy Kyle’) Carew would have been forgiven for giving him a send off had he failed against them in the cup.

He didn’t. This time he let his cricket do the talking in what could possibly be the most exciting game of the season so far.

According to some well respected judges, Quartermaine is a proper player; a batsman of style, substance, power and flair. A player of colour if you will, someone who can light up a game in the split of an eye.

Apparently, he’s just as colourful off it, a modern day Willie Morris capable of performances that will go down in folklore with off-field antics to match.

His brother Ben is just as talented too with his all-round performance in the game playing possibly a bigger part in Narberth going through to the quarter-finals.

Not many would have given Narberth a chance to beat Carew in the cup, but thanks to the Quartermaine’s they did in a brilliant match which was an advert for how exciting the game can be.

A few miles up the road and Cresselly had a scare too courtesy of another individual performance that had the home team twitching.

Cresselly may have scored 185-5 but that mammouth total came under threat from a brutal innings by Kilgetty’s Ross Hardy who produced one of his biggest performances for a while.

He’s lit up the lower leagues in the past, his quality making him the standout player, one who belonged at a higher level and apart from a few innings’ last year and a hundred in the Welsh cup against Neyland a few years back, he’s had a lean time of it of late.

Not on Tuesday however as his 105 almost helped Kilgetty to a memorable win. The records show the Kingsmoor outfit fell 34 runs short but while he was at the crease anything was possible.

Cresselly certainly thought so at the time.

Like Quartermaine, Hardy is a proper player, an attacking batsman capable of playing the purest of shots.

He may give you a chance but he’ll punish you if you miss it rubbing salt into the wound by coming down the wicket to smash you over the top, the ball making a wholesome thud as it flies off the blade with a flourishing follow-through to match.

His innings may not have been as headline grabbing as Ryan Lewis’ hundred off 27 balls the week before but it was just as exciting and there were certainly some exciting performances in the league last Saturday too.

Here’s the team of the week:

  1. Jake Wickes (Hook) 138 not out v Pembroke
  2. Andrew Edwards(Laugharne) 134 v Saundersfoot seconds
  3. Alex Codd (Neyland 2nds) 123 v Lawrenny 2nd
  4. Steve Campbell (Lawrenny 2nd) 122 not out v Neyland 2nds
  5. Phil Llewellyn (LLangwm) 116 v Lawrenny
  6. Nick Koomen (Neyland) 107 not out v Johnston
  7. Henry Durrant (Neyland 100 not out) v Johnston
  8. Scott Brunton (Lamphey) 88 & 3-23 v Haverfordwest 3rds
  9. Andrew Harries (Llangwm 2nds) 5-18 v Hundleton
  10. Andrew Miller (Neyland) 5-19 v Johnston
  11. Morgan Hughes (Hook 2nd) 5-19 v Llanrhian 2nds


Other performances that narrowly miss out:

Richard James (Burton) 95 v Whitland
Matthew Kiff (Llangwm) 83 not out & 3-52 v Lawrenny

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