Match Report May 23rd 2103
Key : * = Team that cancelled 2nd yr running.
Following last week’s politically correct and sensitive report by Bungle of the controversial and entertaining events of the Diocese Match, here comes one by an author unfamiliar with either sentiment.
Thanks to our scheduled opposition being unable to play for the 2nd year running 10 Fisherman found themselves opposition-less on a beautiful May evening (and god knows there haven’t been many ) at Napsbury park with nobody to play.
A single wicket interclub competition was hastily arranged, three overs of batting time each, five run loss for each wicket lost. Nursey ( looking skywards, seeing the approaching rain and wanting to made sure he got some use out of his new bat ) volunteered to open and found himself facing Bungle and Anil for the 1st two overs. Not his preference, but as it turned out he took twice as many runs off the muck they served up as the accurate and bouncy slow right arm that came from Chairman Watson. 20 runs without losing a wicket. A small victory for a minor Batsman with a major bat which had one defensive prod fly past Anil’s outstretched palm straight for the 1st boundary of the game. There were plenty more and much bigger to come, but sadly not from this Batsman.
Dave Summers soon put that score into perspective with 50% more runs scoring 31 despite being bowled several times, the legside boundary suffering particularly and Watson was soon threatening similar areas with his Mongoose to take the highest score so far to 33 despite being caught by Charlie off the ‘bowling’ of his Dad whose shoulder revolutions could be heard above the encroaching wind and rain as far afield as Welwyn Garden City. A quick break for the shower that had been following Anil all the way from Luton (and hopefully won’t follow him to Ambleside tomorrow) allowed the Fishers to excitedly resume Gossip about the previous week’s game .
Bungle was up next and despite being offered up plenty to hit, was strangely subdued and managed only a Nurse equalling 20, earning him a most politically incorrect four letter moniker from Anil that not only insulted the Batsman, but also the previous Batsman who had scored the same total! This rather set the tone for the evening. The great benefit of not playing an opposition is that team behaviour can joyously degenerate without consequence, again unlike the previous game!
Ian Hazon was the 1st batsman to make the Bungle/ Nurse Score look respectable taking his time to move to 18 and leaving him just the one ball to move past them and out of the wooden spoon position. Spurred on by the promise of a pint from Nursey, Dave Hoskins bowled him with an effort ball that will probably keep the Herts association of Physiotherapists in Pol Roger for a year.
Hoskins senior, always wanting to keep the best company became the 3rd batsman to finish on 20 (another politically incorrect four letter moniker then ), before the mighty Dave ‘Barnacle’ Hughes strode to the wicket having finally removed his woolly hat and scarf. Now it is fair to say that run chases are not Dave’s speciality. His attritional qualities are well documented ( if not always praised ) in these pages, and his determination to preserve a strike rate of 1 run every 18 balls was admirable if misjudged. Out a total of 5 times, he finished with a score of minus 3, some 38 off the (spoiler alert!!! ) eventual winning score. He was out twice to Ian Hazon and remarkably supplied Nursey with his 1st Hat-Trick; Sportingly describing this event as ‘Lucky’ due to a good catch, low bounce and a swipe across the line. Well the swipe across the line was your fault, the catch might have looked hard to you but my mum would have taken it, and if you expect good bounce from a round arm bowler coming off one pace on a pudding you’re as much of a politically incorrect, four letter Moniker as the rest of us.
Reevo was always going to be the danger man in the late stages of this competition and so it proved once he’d got his eye in with his trademark lofted drives putting the match ball into the neighbouring cornfield and losing a couple more along the way. His 35 was going to be tough to beat but in a game that we really should have sold tickets to watch, the tension continued to the last ball.
Captain Virji decided to use the game to experiment with Watson’s Mongoose ( take what you want from that statement ) and was soon pinging the ball to all parts and running swiftly between the wickets to give himself a credible 27 and a dilemma as to which bat to use for the rest of the season.
Last up was Hoskins Junior, currently in the middle of his exams, he appeared unfazed by the Target Reevo had set and was soon producing the shots of the match, extra cover drives no less, to chase it down. Needing a mere 11 of the last over, Hoskins Senior applied a can of WD40 to his various creaking parts and got his son out twice in the last 3 balls to reduce his score to 26, thus depriving him of certain victory. Oh to be a fly on the interior windscreen of that car on their way home!
What larks in the parks we had. All agreed this was the most fun we’d had this season and that perhaps we should do it every year. Then again, if Garden Fields keep cancelling we’ll be able to wont we?
So the number 3 figured large in this game. Minus 3 runs to Hughes, 3 30’s including a 33, a 13, three wickets for Nurse; all Hughes, let’s count them 1,2,3 and er…. 3 politically incorrect four letter monikers.
