North Devon 23 August 2021

Captain Nick Bishop

Won by 146 runs

SOA 251 for 6 (Ayyaz Mallick 102, Alex Hodder-Williams 101)

North Devon 105 all out (Henry Welch 8-8)

In the immortal words of Welsh bard and sometime cricketer Max Boyce, “when they ask me, I will say… I was there!”

….and so it will be when we recall the day the emerging talent of Henry Welch was unleashed on an unsuspecting North Devon XI during the first of the two annual Western Tour fixtures.

To set the scene though, and to add more context to the ridiculous magnitude of the performance, we should highlight the fact that the wicket was a good one. SOA had batted first and, after the early departure of Junaid Aziz, Ayyaz Malik (102) and Alex Hodder-Williams (101) added 207 runs for the second wicket before stepping aside and allowing later batsmen to smash a further fifty runs and allow Mike Knox to declare the innings at 251 for 4 from 39 overs.

In reply, the home side started briskly, with little evidence of turn or bounce to the opening SOA attack of Nick Bishop and Jonny Warner and, although the former chipped out Ansell for 20, North Devon approached the last hour on 80 for 1, plenty of wickets in hand and a likely 42 overs in total to chase them down.

Enter our hero and the resultant 34 ball carnage that was to be Welch Jrs devastating spell of leg-breaks and wrong uns.

Starting with the edge behind of Tyson to Graeme Coates for 45 and finishing with the removal of Rothery for a duck to close the innings on 105 all out, Welch turned in marvellous figures of 8 for 8 from 5.4 overs, seemingly without breaking neither stride nor emotion.

In the midst of this, James Lunn picked up the other wicket and SOA left the field behind young Henners wondering just what they had witnessed in that short passage of time.

We’ve all seen out and out pace destroy an innings through pace and fear but this was the most brutal spell of skill and finery we’re ever likely to witness and, as if to prove it wasn’t a fluke, Henry’s first three deliveries in the repeat fixture the next day went for 2, wicket, wicket, as he finished with 3 for 7 and 10 for 15 across the two matches.

Here’s to reading much more about this hugely likeable talent in the coming years.