Last night we had the annual T20 against Old Californians. It’s a game we feel we should, but often don’t, win.
Things began well. I lost the toss and we only had 8 men, one of whom hadn’t played cricket for ten years. The oppo chose to bat first. I started with stalwarts Worrell and Bhupesh. Both were in fine fettle and before we knew it they 8 for 2 off 4 overs. Two wickets for Bhupesh and some miserly stuff from Worrell, with both bowlers using the oft forgotten art of pitching the ball up. Spirits were high at this point although were dampened slightly at the sight of Phil running onto the pitch in a rather tight shirt.
However, Old Californians started to settle now with Sparky and ‘Some Other Bloke’ starting to score freely as the gaps in the field really started to tell. Sparky, in particular, used all his experience to rotate the strike and keep the scoreboard ticking over. KP, Phil, and Havien all had a go before Bhupesh came back to take two quick wickets and slow the scoring rate down. Sparky remained unmoved however and started to take the attack to our final bowlers Ed, new boy Guy and latterly Phil. Eventually they got to a larger-than-it-should-have-been 156 off 20 overs with Sparky finishing on 88 not out.
The bowling stats are as follows:
- Worrell 2-0-6-0
- Bhupesh 4-1-5-4
- KP 4-0-32-0
- Phil 3-0-34-0
- Havien 2-0-19-0
- Ed 3-0-29-0
- Guy 2-0-28-0
As we prepared to bat there was confidence amongst the Park Hill 9 that we could knock these runs off. Bhups and Mackay started brightly with some excellent batting, hitting the bad balls for boundaries and constantly rotating the strike. Eventually Bhups fell for 28 hitting a 2 bouncer straight back into the bowlers hands, much to his chagrin. Worrell came in next and immediately fell apart mentally as his old nemesis Beeksy came onto bowl, somehow managing to get caught behind. Next up was debutante Havien who batted solidly and formed a good partnership with the irrepressible Mackay. But then just as the skipper uttered the words “Mackay will guide us to victory here” he got himself stumped to the slowest ball in living memory.
Together Havien and I managed to add 40+ in quick time before I got myself stumped, mainly due to the lightning reactions of the 50+ year old wicketkeeper. Not to worry though as Guy and Havien guided us to victory with 10 balls to spare as the darkness set.
Overall, it was a good team performance with everyone contributing in some way to the victory. Thanks again to all those who came out and played.
PHCC Batting stats:
- Bhupesh ct & bowled 28
- Alex M Stumped 41
- Worrell ct behind 4
- Havien NOT OUT 37
- Goldsbrough Stumped 25
- Guy NOT OUT 8
DNB: Ed, Phil, KP
Park Hill Cricket Club 