20th May 2009 – Remnants Away

It would have been better if the first post on our new blog had been to describe a fine victory, but as it was we can hold our heads high.

After last year’s game, where Jim did his one man band impression, it was nice to see a team performance with contributions from everyone involved. In fact, Mr Thorpe followed his 68 not out with what the score book records as a first ball duck. Oh dear… Never mind Jim – we are playing them again on 22nd July!

Remnants won the toss and decided to bat, which is perfectly sensible given that they had a couple of openers who put on 79 for the first wicket in 11 overs. A certain Mr Jordan getting 47 very classy runs, ably assisted by Serby with 29. Both were removed by Matt Bailey – once he turned up half an hour or so late. Would the result have been different if he’d been on time and opened the bowling? We’ll never know – because he’s always late 🙂

After that, Remnants managed to keep runs ticking over, in spite of losing wickets regularly. Their eventual score of 146-6 being the least that their openers deserved.

Spare a thought for Woolfie – a regular Remnant and occasional Shark, he was run out after falling over going for a quick single and was eventually run out by an ever so casual Thorpe. Did he know that there was a run out on the cards? If he did, he was very cool about it. Taking the throw from Martin, standing there for what seemed like 15 minutes before strolling towards the stumps – and then throwing them down from three yards in a minor panic as he realised that Russell might actually make it in!

Pick of the bowlers has to be Matt Bailey with 3-31 off 4 overs – but I wont waste any more column inches on Matt as he doesn’t need the extra publicity. The other wickets fell to Pat 1-17 off 3 and Mayu 1-19 off 2 and of course Jim again with 1-13 off 1.

Jim’s bowling was unplayabale… You can’t keep the stand in skipper out of the headlines can you? First ball he removed Lea, then in the rest of the over got the aforementioned Woolfie run out. It was all action – not surprising given that there were at least 12 balls in the over. To be fair to the umpire, it could have been a few more too…

The Sharks reply started with far too many dot balls as Jez (me) and Kev played air shots at the Remnants openers. I got my traditional nick through the slips for 4 in a score of 17 at a run a ball. The score was 28  when I finally got out. Thanks Steve. That’s the last time we give the oppo our best fielder as a sub. It was a good catch – half diving, but to be fair the whole thing happened in slow motion. The ball was bowled so slowly the speed gun missed it and the shot was so badly mistimed that (at least where I was standing) it was a simple catch – even if Steve has to “dive” to reach it.

Martin was next in and fair play, he hit it a long way. The problem was that it was a long way up in the air – Bearders will be happy in his final resting place though… caught T Jordan, bowled A Jordan. The father / son combo worked its magic and I suppose its a good thing for T Jordan (and Mrs Jordan too no doubt) that the son didn’t drop a skyer off his dad’s bowling.

After that Kev, joined by the impressive Mayu kicked on. Kevin scored 6 off his first 13 balls, then proceeded to add 25 off his next 15, including a 6 which nearly broke the pavilion window. Sadly, Kev was to fall to a straight one from Lea.

Mayu did well though, playing off the front and back foot in a 20 ball innings in which he scored 22 runs. Lea again the wicket taker.

Our star studded middle order will surely have better days, but the devilishly tricky Adrian Mellish (who got me last year and is another occasional Shark) made it look easy with a spell of 4-28 off his 4 overs, claiming the illustrious scalps of Thorpe, Parker, Connors and Bradley. Where last year we perished dancing down the wicket and getting stumped, this year, Jim, Steve and Pat all got out missing straight ones trying to cut… Will we ever figure him out??

Things were looking done and dusted by then: 90-8, with 5 overs remaining and 57 to get. With the crowd begging the umpires to offer the light (to save a draw, ahem…). If Remnants were worried by that stage they would have been paranoid. 57 off 5 with 2 wickets remaining might happen occasionally, but Mr Duckworth and Mr Lewis reckon you need to be 122-8 at that stage to be in a winning position.

Ralph and Matt arrived at the wicket with very little to lose. That they got within 14 runs of the target is testament to some fine batting from two of our better players. Ralph ended not out 23 off 18 balls while Matt (oh alright, more column inches for him as he did very well), also got 23 runs (not out) off 12 balls, including 19 off his last 5.

We were 32 runs behind the par score with 5 overs to go so to finish only 14 behind is a small victory, albeit not one you can put in the W column.

Next game – Techtronix at home on Thursday 28th May.