Savills 135-1 (Simkins 27*, Bailey 25*, Lait 1-22) beat Jagex 134-6 (Fardell 40*, Van Daal 28*, Verma 26*, Bailey 27-2) by 9 wickets
Let's start with the good news first. It was really sunny. I mean, a proper scorcher. The other goods news was Enzo was back on duty in the Jagex kitchen, and we've all come to know that this means, ace tea. Cracking chicken skewers. Quiche. Lots of dip. Rustic bread with real fillings. Enzo, my man, your tea is so good, we feel like you are out there on the field with us as a kind of food carrying 12th man/cheerleader.
Now the bad news. We lost again. This isn't our biggest losing streak ever, but one more game and it will be. Savills, the really big estate agents, were the oppo this evening. They were inadvertently aided by several Jagexer's cancelling at the last possible minute. I'm going to have a word with several people's line managers and ensure they are on toilet cleaning duty at some point in the next week - or whatever the web/computer game equivalent is - like QA'ing tic tac toe on the midnight shift.
Anyway we won another toss and decided to bat. Fardell and Colledge got things going at a brisk pace with 27 plundered from the first 4 overs, mainly courtesy of the hard flashing hands of Fardell, who quite literally had a swing at everything. Some runs were genuine biffs that went were I intended, others were scored over the solitary slip to third man when I had cow corner in my sights. Colledge took a while to get going, hit a nice four square, and then got out to a nice catch at short cover. He'd been carrying an injury as well, but had manfully stepped up and played anyway when other, lesser, men had chickened out because, "they were busy". At such times is the measure of a man judged.
Van Daal came in and opened his batting in curious style, jumping to leg away from a ball, and offering no shot, leaving it to miss leg stump by a fraction. He looked me square in the eye immediately after and said, "oh dear, I won't be doing that again". After a couple of sighters, he got going, and was joined by Brett for company when Fardell retired on 25. Brett only lasted two balls. Pretty much the same as last week, one lovely forward defensive, and one wild swipe that was caught behind. To be fair the bowling was consistently pretty good. Brett's friend, Mr Phillips, joined us sportingly late in the day. He encouraged Van Daal to have a go, and have a go he did, scoring with some unorthodox shots to, well, pretty much anywhere he fancied. He's no respecter of the quality of the bowling. If he fancies hitting one, he just hits it. He did manage to get 5 overthrows, courtesy of the square leg umpire (Fardell) tactically distracting the square leg fielder (some dude).
Phillips unfortunately was caught going straight back over the bowler's head by one that stuck in the pitch a bit, meaning our three weekend batsmen on the evening had scored a grand total of 7 runs. This brought Lait to the crease. He manfully tried to fend off the good stuff, only to see an in-swinger destroy his middle stump, so no 250 strike rate this week. This brought Love Verma to the crease. Hitherto known for his pacy bowling, he took a while to get going, and then hit several wonderful shots, including a hoick to cow corner where he seems to play the shot in two motions: bringing the bat towards the ball in an arc, stopping dead still; and then initiating the second shot that actually does the damage. He can hit it so hard, he actually cracked Simon Lait's "£30 from Sports Direct" bat.
Amoraal kept him company for a while, hitting 3 fours in basically the same spot, before he was bowled by another good one. His swinging and connecting is really a sight to behold, I fear for the ball, the bat and the cows. Broadbridge then was out in the middle for a bit, playing and missing a few sighters before absolutely middling one over extra cover, and then another, before being bowled.
This brought Fardell back to the crease, and saw Love retire on 26*. Fardell and Van Daal propelled the scoreboard to a defendable 134 with several shots over midwicket. Van Daal once more did his little crazy South African bunny hop to leg. Fardell finished on 40*, by some miracle on 34th street. The bowling this week was, once more, top notch, with few loose balls. The track was playing very true though, as Queens is apt to do, so there are runs in it if you get lucky.
Amoraal opened the bowling, but struggled in his length and offered a few half trackers in his 2 over spell to allow their batsmen an easy start.
With 9 fielders and an occasional sub, it was going to be a tough ask to plug the gaps. It was going to be even tougher given that we had Mr Misfield helping the opposition out this evening. Brett bowled the other end, and saw Van Daal not once, but twice, allow an easy stop for one run, race on past him for 4. One of the balls actually sped up as it went through him: I literally have no idea how that is physically possible. The other he only avoided by contorting like Neo from the original Matrix. Love replaced Amoraal and continued in his quest to be the most economic bowler in Cambridge evening 20/20 cricket history with a brilliant 4 over spell, conceding only 20 runs. He really deserved a wicket as well, and we're gutted he didn't get one.
Amoraal got in on the misfield action, stepping over one like a proper footballer. I mentioned something to him about fatness and maybe trying out spin class, and he genuinely looked like he was going to chin me. I ran away in fear, taking a deeper fielding position. Running is a great defence to an Amoraal attack...
All of their batsmen were looking accomplished except one, who had played and missed about 12 dots. Fardell, in a piece of inspired captaincy designed to bring us from a 10 wicket spanking down to a, well, 9 wicket pummelling, brought on Lait. He bowled some cracking lines, and after some persistence, patience, another misfield (this time from Love) and some poor encouragement, he got the batsman to hoick one to Fardell at short midwicket.
Fardell then let it all get to him, choosing Broadbridge (great choice) and Colledge (not so much) to tie down both ends with spin. Broadbridge did well. Colledge, deserved much better, but he got carted for 18 from his one over to leave it all but lost. Fardell tried to introduce some sledging at the end, calling the departing low scorer a dot warrior. I tried some fishing metaphors. I tried calling Power of Love. No one smiled. No one laughed. The game even finished on a wide.
In the depressing words of The Boss, Bruce Springsteen, "No wedding day smiles, no walk down the aisle. No flowers, no wedding dress". Losing streaks are depressing.
Next week we have S-Tech, a more winnable game, not least as it brings the power of Jamy Nigri back to the team - possibly the only American ever to play cricket and not suck at it. I am willing to stand by this statement, and am prepared for the hate-mail.
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