The sun shone brightly on a wonderful weekend of cricket with the OB Cricket team, the Butterflies, returning for their first fixtures of 2025.
On Saturday, the Butterflies were bowled out for 142 with Ollie Drew’s 67 off 53 balls saving what could have been a very low score. Fred B’s 4 wickets for 8 runs off 3 overs was the highlight for Bryanston who fielded well and restricted the flow of runs throughout the innings. In reply the 1st XI got off to a brisk start with openers Leo C and Ranuk J scoring 40 and 60 respectively. Ranuk falling to a brilliant catch on the boundary, followed by some tight bowling by Baz Street and Ben Ladd Gibbon put some pressure on the 1st XI batters. They got over the line with 6 wickets to spare, Hugh F hitting the winning runs with a lovely straight drive for 4.
On Sunday, a different looking Butterflies side took on the Staff XI. The Butterflies batted first again and a solid opening partnership from Guy Bucknell and Cam Robertson, built on by a classy 75 off 47 balls by Kumar Sangakkara, which saw the Butterflies reach a strong total of 247 for 4 off their 35 overs. In reply, the staff also had a great opening partnership of 90 between Ben Pullan and Owen Morris. When Owen was bowled by the ever tricky bowling of Baz Street, Rory McCann came to the wicket, narrowly missing out on a half century. Ben finished on 63 but the rest of the batting struggled to keep up with the run rate and the Staff XI finished on 215 for 8, 32 runs short of their target. Finn Young was the pick of the Butterflies bowlers with 4 wickets off 6 overs.
The Butterflies return for another fixture against the 1st XI in the final week of term and then again for their cricket week, playing OB teams from other local schools starting from around July 7.
Please email [email protected] if you’d like to find out more about joining the Butterflies team.
