Match Report
05/06/2016 v BEXLEY PARKWOOD
lost
Historic day as ODWCC field 2 teams on same day
Sunday saw DDDNA’s (Also know as Dartech’s Don’t Do Names Apparently) playing the usual strong adversaries Bexley Park at Bexley Park although Bexley Park were away but took the home changing room, raising suspicions that they didn’t want to put out the boundary markers so conned us. Thanks to Peg and Sam P for doing that before I arrived. Peg clearly wanted to get his money’s worth and made sure we used every inch of that pitch!
As a home game it meant I didn’t have to agree to any timed game schenanigans and when the idea of 40 was suggested I accepted simply for the fact we were not going to play a timed game. Suggestions after that that we could have done with 35 instead which I agree albeit the 40 allowed a nice bit of young play later on that I will come to.
Bexley Park won the toss and chose to bat so we headed out for 40 overs, in the 25oc heat on a pitch bigger than Scotland. Vishnu and Viran opened the bowling. I primed them that it was a bowlers pitch and decided who would bowl where in line with expected bounce. Sod’s law for me being so definitive because the pitch did pretty much the opposite and actually for a Bexley Park pitch it was pretty fair to the batsman. Viran and Vishnu bowled a decent spell to ten overs but Bexley scored at a decent rate. We were not looking dangerous but in credit, it was looking like a batsman wicket.
Jason and Peg came on and played a technically astute ‘if I bowl it everywhere, the batsman isn’t going to be ready for the straight one’. Credit to the wily buggers because it worked and both took the first 2 wickets of the day and Jason in total took 3. It was Peg’s first spell of the year and only Jason’s second so they are warming up. 3 catches dropped although two were for potential caught and bowled and Jason’s was smashed at him. Next we had Sam R come in who pretty much bowled it bang on from beginning to end of his 5 including one straight one that evaded the batsman, was heading for the stumps before launching itself abnormally over by several inches. We all like a bouncing ball but not when it’s gone past the batsman and heading for the stumps. Somewhere in all this was a great catch by Vishnu diving forward and low at point to everyone’s delight. Vishnu now buoyed at his efforts came back on to bowl and bowled a great spell taking a well deserved wicket in the process. Varun came back in and took another and Kuldeep gave me the gloves and put on a bowling display so good that made me look foolish for giving him the gloves in the first place. Thanks to Kuldeep for keeping again! Late in the game after the final few wickets Bexley threw on their 10 year old player to bat with his Dad so we brought on Jo and Sam P. Little Jo only primary school himself came on to bowl with a great display of control and was met with an equally impressive resistance. I don’t think I was that good at 10 and probably not even at 35. Great stuff from Jo and Sam P. Some intentional dubious wicket keeping by me to allow the young boy to face the strike included on one occasion me accidently stopping the ball and then throwing it away behind me, cue Charlie not quite understanding what was going on and trying to rib me from deep for giving one away. What a Charlie! The oppo finished on 215.
Special mention to little Jo making his debut. Following prior parental discussion and in order to protect him we had him at fine leg and this meant running from end to end for 40 overs. All concern over this was dismissed by Sam R as he assured me he would be fine in that way that siblings do when they just don’t care in the way a parent would ;o) .Great stuff!
Tea was adequate although not sure if trolled by the tea person because they decided to add red chillies to the tuna mayo. I like chilli but even I was sweating, so not sure how everyone else coped.
When it came down to batting we had only two recognised opening batsmen. Not only are the only ones recognised to open they are also bloody good at it. Despite moans of “I’m 135 years old” and “I’ve got something in my eye” they soon focussed and showed just why they were so important. The bowling was good and it was not easy to get the openers away who bowled through their full 8 each in one go. At 20 overs we had scored 75 for no wickets. Commendable position. Yes we needed 140 for the last 20 overs but we had all our batsman waiting so perfectly placed. Jason eventually fell for 38 from a ball that stayed so low that it bounced twice before reaching him and maybe even bounced again before hitting the stumps (so legal but morally reprehensible ball behaviour). In came Charlie to a team who know him well from his Saturday Cricket days. The game was on and with the boundary the way it was it was all about the big bash wickets in hand and all. Charlie was soon out and I came in with the hulk smash mentality. I was either going to hit it or get out and there was no other way to play at this stage. Peg though knackered scored a tremendous 61 before falling. Grear first knock of the season. Special mention of the furthest 4 I think I’ve ever hit on the massive leg side boundary. I was almost signalling for my own six before the arms started waving low for the four. Young Sam R came in we concocted a plan to be attacking. It didn’t work and for the second time this year the Captain’s player of the year last year was run out by the Captain. I’m sure I’m doing the same to him as Jason used to do to me. Unfortunately we were at the stage where the run rate was so high we were pushing pushing pushing and mistakes are made. Carrying on with the theme of judgment, my last ball saw the bowler bowled down my leg side and I thought I’d let it go and hit me. Sadly for me my leg was in front of leg stump and I was off for a pretty pathetic end that had the oppo scratching their heads at what the hell I was doing. Note to self – try hitting the ball! So I was off for 23 and Varun and Vishnu were in and tried to continue where I left off. That included a few big hits and a run out when a pushed 2 didn’t quite happen when Varun stopped in the middle, poured himself a cup of tea and then carried on running at which point the bails were gone. Ravi followed out and as the time went on we realised we were not going to get there and I went for a shower. Ravi I am told (pocket dynamo esqu) hit some big shots probably about the same time as I was washing under my arms. Sam P and Jo saw us off with the Bexley’s 10 year old bowling to Jo to finish us off. Some great work on both sides saw us to the end scoring a respectable 191 which was 24 under target but a decent crack.
Thanks to Steve R for a good 30 overs umpiring and James Denman who helped us out with 15 or so.