Match Report
-v- Blue Bell Hill II at Blue Bell Hill 23 August
Prematch
Our early season drubbing of BBH by nine wickets, was never likely to be repeated as we sought the continuance of winning form at their small, picturesque ground.On paper at least,we were fielding a strong eleven,despite the absence of Danglers,rumoured to be suffering from an inflamed scrotum. The match On a splendid wicket, it was no suprise to find ourselves in the field, after Spud made his usual hash of the toss.Old Man Martin managed to put his disastrous Ray Willis form behind him in a spell of dogged accuracy,and while Jim bowled his normal dross from the other end, we imagined a target of little over the ton to be realistic.BBHs final total of 155 owed much to our generous over rate (46 in all) and even more to the creative accountancy of their scorer,who managed to manufacture an extra ten runs from where,-only he knows. Undaunted by odds that seemed heavily stacked against us and that the scorer had now replaced pencil with rubber, presumably to erase runs,should we approach to close to the target. After the usual pantomine from Chucks, Darkie and Snippy entertained with an attackive partnership,which added sixty runs in three-quarters of an hour.A somewhat needless run out (thats a change) saw the demise of NeilC and brought the resurgent talent of Mr Whippy to the crease.Timms set about his normal childish prank of losing the ball over the shortest garden boundary in a manic onslaught, that threatened to have the game signed sealed and delivered before opening time.Unfortunately he lost his partner and not for the first time our innings lost its way.Mark had once again played the patient foil role and fell just five short of fifty.The rapid loss of Morrison and Schultz gave Bill an opportunity to emphasise his complete lack of ability, to any that believed otherwise.From nowhere he he discovered an uncanny ability to to successfully defend his wicket, but neglected to note that we did actually need to run back and forward a few times to gain victory. Frustration nagged its way into GTs game as he was starved of the strike.
Amid cries of"run him out" Spud attempted to resurrect our faltering challenge and in the process remove Bill from the affray.After a quick-fire dozen,he managed only to end his own involvement in the match and was forced to anxiously spectate as Chris showed all the guts that we know he has,in supplying the necessary runs for victory.As for Bill - Of all the clubs in the world, why did he have to walk into ours. At our sociable best we left Spud to chat to their skip, while we encamped ourselves around one table.
