Now Is The Winter Of Our Discontent

That May Turn Glorious Summer……..

Going into this game I was feeling positive, feeling confident that we could get a result, how did that work out? Well, chatting to someone in Cadnam’s team I have played with in the past I was told that we were unlucky this week as all their players for the ones and twos were available, which meant that the threes batting was a lot stronger than usually as a couple of bats had to drop down. Ah well thinks I, we can bowl them out just as well as anyone. Cadnam won the toss and elected to bat. The first ball of the innings was ‘a bit wayward’; a waist high full toss that got dispatched over the boundary into the long grass which took about 10 minutes to find. Hmm, 7 runs down with no balls being bowled, I was finding myself thinking ‘I don’t believe in omens, but er, that’s not a great start’…….

So we got taken for 298 runs, which is kind of a lot. I am going to put this down to three reasons. The first is the opposition batsmen, M Thomas in particular, who smashed a 150 before retiring, well played sir, well played. He was well supported by a couple of others. When good players are on their game, sometimes there is nothing you can do about it. The second is that we did suffer from bad luck. An opening bowler who was injured bowling and had to go off, another bowler also pulled something, could stay on but could not bowl anymore. Kev Roberts in the field took a nasty blow to the face and had to go off to deal with the bleeding, at one point we were down to nine fielders until one came back (and we did get a sub on as well). Sometimes it is just one of those days and there is nothing you can do.

 Kev Roberts fielding at Mid Off after coming back onto the field

The third reason though is stuff we could do something about. A lot of the bowling again was to short, so the batsman could just lean back and whack through it, and whack through it they did. The fielding was also sloppy, people letting the ball through them so it was going for a 4 rather than a dot or 1, this happened more than once. At times it looked like some fielders were scared of the ball. This could be a result of children playing against men who were admittedly hitting the ball very hard, welcome to grown up cricket……. We also started to look ragged in the field, with people complaining to each other, bowlers complaining about fields, three fielders going for the same catch, one of them putting a name on it but too late and the others not pulling out, it started to look like it could be the sort of game that could damage a team. And when people walked off at the end of the innings we were not happy bunnies. However, things were a lot better by the end of the innings than in the middle – how so?

Well, first our bowling performance got a lot better, mainly headed by the Dearing father and son combination. Dearing the younger was bowling wheels for a 13 year old and Dearing the older took the role of ‘seasoned old pro’. Although the fact that they both pitched it up so the bats had to work for their runs probably helped. The fielding also improved as the bowling did, so the bats could not just whack it all over, funny how that happens, an improvement in one area bringing an improvement in another, it’s almost like it’s a team game, I mean, Jesus, even I took a catch. So even though we went for loads, we ended up taking 8 wickets which was some positivity to cheer us up.

So, how did our traditionally dodgy batting fair? Surprisingly well to be honest. The openers opened with some intent and scored at a decent pace. When they both went we then lost another 3 wickets bringing fears of a traditional collapse. The ship was steadied though, with Zac Stainer-Reid scoring a 50 not out and a couple of others biffing in with decent scores. Zac had to bat carefully which meant that the rate was never close enough to win the game but we were not only batting for the game, but also for some hope for the rest of the season. We ended up getting to 200, which was full batting points and by far our best score of the season; and in another game would have been a competitive total. So for a game that at one point looked like it was going to do real damage to the team, we came out with a loss but in a manner that we could take respect from and have optimism for the future. Taking 11 out of 12 batting and bowling points also lifted us off the foot of the table and up a couple of places.  

So it seems like we are now looking at things from the other end of the lens from the beginning of the season. The batting is looking like it is improving and it is now the bowling that needs to get on it, pitching it up and making the opposition work for their runs.  Imagine what would happen if we managed to fire our batting and bowling in the same game? World beaters eh?

Match scorecard