25 Years of The Bowl: Hampshire’s 2005 season brings in silverware

The highlight of 2005, after 13 barren years, came when Hampshire won silverware by defeating Warwickshire in the C&G Trophy Final at Lord’s. Since they also finished runners-up to County Champions Nottinghamshire, it was a successful season although the Championship conclusion brought frustration.

During the winter Hampshire signed Sean Ervine who had played for Zimbabwe in the Rose Bowl’s first international match, plus Kevin Pietersen and Richard Logan from Nottinghamshire. Pietersen made an impressive debut for England’s limited-overs side in South Africa, scoring three centuries for England in that series. He then participated in England’s thrilling recovery of the Ashes in 2005. Chris Tremlett made his limited-overs debut for England and took two wickets in two balls v Bangladesh at Trent Bridge.

Hampshire beat Shropshire, Glamorgan, Surrey and Yorkshire on their way to the Lord’s Final. At the Oval, Surrey posted 358-6, a record against the county, but Watson with 132 led the reply, supported by forties from Crawley, New Zealander Craig McMillan and Udal who was deputizing as captain for Warne while he participated in the Ashes series. Ervine’s century took Hampshire to victory in the semi-final, and he repeated the feat in the final, while Australians (‘Andy’) Bichel and Watson took three wickets each. Despite a fine century from Nick Knight, Hampshire won by 18 runs.

By contrast, Hampshire won just five of their 16 National League matches, finished bottom, and were relegated. They won just three of their eight T20 matches so did not qualify for the knock-out stages.

In the Championship, Hampshire won three and drew two of the first five matches before a reverse at Stratford from where they went to Trent Bridge and in a rain-affected match challenged Nottinghamshire to score 276 to win. They reached 250-4 but with 18 needed from four overs, Chris Tremlett’s ‘hat-trick’ reduced them to 261-9 and Warne completed the victory. With Pothas injured, deputy John Crawley effected six dismissals in the second innings – a Hampshire record. They topped the table, but two defeats followed.

At Cheltenham, Bichel, who had replaced McMillan scored 138 on debut, the sixth debut centurion at Hampshire, sharing a record eighth wicket partnership with Pothas (139), rescued Hampshire from 81-7 as they added 257. In mid-September Hampshire still had hopes of the title until at Canterbury, Nottinghamshire declared setting Kent 420 in 70 overs and bowled them out. The new Champions came to the Rose Bowl for the last match and with Warne still angry about that game, Hampshire posted their record score of 714-5 although he declared on Crawley when, with 311*, he was just five runs short of Moore’s record score for Hampshire. Mascarenhas and Udal bowled Hampshire to victory by an innings and 188 runs.

On 13 June, at the Rose Bowl, England beat Australia by 100 runs in the first-ever T20 international, while Oasis appeared in a concert on the ground.

Hampshire are celebrating 25 Years of The Bowl all year with one of the headline anniversary fixtures taking place on 29 May as Surrey visit Utilita Bowl. Get your Blast tickets now at: https://www.utilitabowl.com/cricket/tickets/