While London was snowed in the week before Christmas, I was invited to play a game of cricket. A week before Christmas and playing cricket? It couldn't have felt more wrong yet Toby and Jamie the co-organisers managed to rally up "eighteen once a decade'rs and 4 virtual professionals" for a game of 20/20 in aid of Save the Children and Child In Need Institute(CINI) at the British school in Delhi.
Being the altruistic fella that I am, I accepted with gusto and immediately began to talk up my ability. It was after being dispatched to Sarogini Nagar market several times to pick up cricket whites, I realised my inclusion had more to do with having time on my hands than genuine cricketing ability!
With temperatures in the high 20's and the feel of a summers day adding to the strangeness of it all, we gathered and in true tradition of the playground Toby and Jamie were elected as team captains and had one pick each until the unfortunate last man standing. His name will be protected to hide his shame but he was close to manning the bouncy castle for the day!
The CINI team (Jamie's) won the toss and elected to bat first a decision that looked to have backfired as they were quickly reduced to 18-4. With talk in the field being of "early lunch and a few beers" and "possibly letting them bat twice,maybe 3 times" confidence was high. Unfortunately the confidence was Misplaced!
A partnership between Glen and Nigel was beautifully crafted to take the score to 84-4 before compulsory retirement (at 30) was enforced. With Fergus dispatched back to the pavilion (bouncy castle) considerably quicker than the ball that got him out, confidence was once again high in the Save the Children camp. Then came Jamie.
Now Jamie had claimed to be "reasonably handy with the bat", but a long time ago. As it turned out, he was more than "a bit handy". Having taken out the windows of a neighbouring hospital not to mention the windows of several cars innocently driving along the adjacent road with mighty sixes, he was forced to retire on thirty for health and safety reasons. He was allowed back in after the fall of the last three wickets (Trevor and James respectively making double figures) to add a further 11 and help his team to a tally of 175.
The only incredible thing from a bowling point of view -apart from Tom Le Quesne taking 3 wickets in one over to polish off the tail- was that we nearly outscored Jamie in extras! With Toby considering replacing me for the bouncy castle mid way through my second over things were at a real low and it was eventually only the umpires generosity that kept the score below 200!
The less said about the batting from Toby's Save the Children team the better. All out for a paltry 86, the second law of the playground was invoked and we all batted again to get through the twenty overs, reaching a rather pathetic 146. Credit through gritted teeth to Jon who bowled a spell of devastating three-bounce-daisy cutters to remove our top order - including me for the days only duck - and a spell of 3-0-1-11 from Richard 'me a swan's wily leg spin.
Worth a mention was a quite brilliant reverse sweep for 4 from Toby (who also ended with a credible 32 from 2 innings and produced a cat like performance behind the stumps),a dashing 14 from Adam Leetham and knocks of nineteen from Gary and sixteen from Jono creeping into the realms of respectable. Run outs were too many to mention as we collectively realised getting between the wicket wasn't as easy as it was at school and that though great fun, bi-monthly would appear to be plenty!
Revenge will be sweet if the re-match happens in February, most of us may well have recovered by then.
No comments:
Post a Comment