MARK EVENSON said he was left stunned as his Bromsgrove side slumped to a surprise eight-wicket defeat to Birmingham League Division One relegation battlers Old Hill.
Hill, who were rock bottom of the table before Saturday’s game, won the toss and elected to field but looked to be in deep trouble as Alexei Kervexee notched up his third century of the season with a strong 107 off 95 balls.
Alistair Hickman built a well crafted 32 not out backed up by Jayden Levitt (21), Matthew Dallaway (26) and Evenson (15 no) as the Boars reached a respectable 233-8 from their 55 overs.
Billy-J Cox (3-34) and Ashfak Hussain (3-80) got the pick of the wickets.
However, what followed was totally out of the blue as Hill stormed to victory thanks to strong batting displays from Jimmy Howell (93) and Monil Patel (96 no) as the Cradley Heath outfit stroked their way to 234-2 in the 37th over.
The win lifted Hill off the foot of the table up to second-from-bottom, just 22 points behind fourth-from-bottom Bromsgrove.
Evenson said: “It was a really bizarre afternoon and I think Old Hill were more shocked with the result than we was.
“I always say that you have to earn the right to win a game of cricket and to post 233 was a good knock thanks to a strong century from Alexei and when I spoke to Hill’s captain Danny Cox at tea time, he said we had posted too many runs for them to get a result.
“But fair play to them as they came out really positively and hit the boundaries well and we could not stem the flow of runs.
“It’s a really strange result but we’ve had discussions once again that Alexei is proving to be the one man show.
“We know he’s a big player for us but we need more contributions from the rest of our squad and hopefully our experienced batsmen Jayden Levitt and Ashley Newfield can hit some form.”
Evenson and his Boars side will be looking to put an end to their three-game losing streak on Saturday when they make the trip to Moseley outfit Attock.
Newfield and Ben Tegg are set to return while bowler George Marshall has been called up from the Seconds.
“Good application is key this weekend and I think we’re very ill-disciplined with some of the bowling hence the changes,” Evenson added.
“We’re quite fortunate that we’ve got strength in depth and back-to-back wins will push us right back up to where we want to be, starting this weekend.
“If we can post a score above 230 again I’ll be confident we can go on to secure victory but what happened against Old Hill was a freak result, really bizarre to say the least.”
