Cavendish Cricket Club

I probably don’t need to go into the background to this match in great detail, but let’s just say it took about 73 emails, a promise to pay the opposition’s match fees and buy a round of drinks, and several prayers for fine weather to even get a start.  We finally got to Churchill with 11 players (thanks to Justin P for drafting in Joe in a corridor at the last minute) to begin the task at hand: make it 9 from 10 in the League. If we won the game, our position at the top of the table would be unassailable. Of course there were other even more pressing matters at stake: 1. our pride, 2. a satisfactory resolution of our dispute over the defaulted match, and (most importantly) 3. final proof that molecular biology is essentially a jumped-up and dubious branch of science that is ultimately subservient to the fundamental laws of Physics.

Indeed, a phone call of support immediately prior to stepping onto the ground from an anonymous caller identifying himself only as “James D. Watson” served to fortify our resolve on this last point: “Have a bat, Mattie,” he said, “they tend to be vulnerable in the first 5-6 overs due to a genetic predisposition to over-attacking”.  When the toss went our way, we put the theory to the test.  It was Brett (107*) who repeatedly penetrated their infield like a virus bursting through a cell membrane, and causing the molecular biologists to change tactics after the 6th over.  Colin played a fine hand in the partnership before departing, which began a minor outbreak of the jitters in the upper order, and it was up to Brett to steady the ship and keep the scoring rate up.  We finished with 144 from our 16 overs — an asking rate of 9 an over that would be difficult even on a slow and consistent track.

Damo began our defensive campaign in his usual style by claiming a wicket-maiden with his first over, and continued to tie them down and bundle them out during his 4 over spell.  Brett once again starred with the ball, and Colin’s neat work with the gloves ensured three very timely run-outs — the most impressive of which resulted from a flat boundary throw from Joe.  We really must recruit more Olympic standard javelin throwers from the United States. Despite some initial resistance from their skipper and a couple of others, in the end the molecular biologists were found to be susceptible to the persistant accuracy of our bowlers and tight fielding displayed by all.  We kept them to 112, even as the final few overs descended into farce and batsmen were allowed second chances by grinning umpires due to ineptitude or inexperience. In the end it was smiles all round as we honoured our promise to buy the psuedo-scientists a drink, and the Cav boys celebrated a top of the table finish to the season by retiring to the Churchill MCR. Well done lads.

Another sunny evening and a firm, dry pitch at Churchill. Our opponents seemed to be in some doubt as to whether to bat, so we obliged by winning the toss and making the obvious decision: put the runs on the board. With Brett missing, we reverted to our previous opening combo, with Matt playing sheet anchor and Colin (79, including 10 boundaries) resuming his familiar role and plundering the hapless Biochemical bowlers all over the park. While several kept a decent line and length, there was a certain lack of penetration to the attack, and some good straight bats and a lot of running brought up a hundred partnership in the 13th over. We stumbled a little at this stage, losing 5 wickets in short order and only scoring 21 runs in the last 5 overs, but the healthy start enabled us to post an asking rate of nearly 8 runs an over.

With Damo cavorting through Eastern Europe, Ed and JB opened our attack, and some tidy bowling saw the bad guys struggling for runs before Ed (2/21) cleaned up their opener in his third over. With the final ball of his spell he then took out their danger man from Durban, who complained to the umpire despite an edge to the ‘keeper that was audible from the boundary. Although they were still well in touch with the required run rate at 3/59, in the final analysis the Biochemists were not able to come back from this loss. Matt managed to hit the off stump with the first ball of his spell, but it was the leg bail that came off (arguably due to a rebound from Colin’s boot) so the batsman remained. However on the 3rd ball of the over Ed got himself into the game again with a blistering catch at cover to have them 4/65. Thomas bowled with his usual guile, and absolutely bamboozled their number 5 before having him stumped. The visitors were able to push close to 10 an over from their final 5, but found they had left their run too late and were still 26 runs short at the close. Although our bowling and fielding could have been a little tighter, we showed good experience and composure to comfortably secure our 6th win running against an opposition that was stronger than their previous form might have indicated. Well done boys.

Cavendish

Batting
C. Evans caught Ward 79
M. Riddle bowled Stewart 37
J. Palfreyman caught Stewart 2
E. Crossland bowled Rami 1
J. Benesch bowled Rami 2
K.J. Thomas not out 9

Extras 25

Total 5/155

Biochemistry

Batting
Brian bowled Crossland 12
Stewart ct behind Evans Crossland 24
James caught Crossland bowled Riddle 14
Tom not out 46
Nick run out 12
Kad stumped Evans bowled K.J. Thomas 2

Extras 18

Total 5/129

Bowling
E. Crossland 5-0-21-2
J. Benesch 5-0-31-0
K.J. Thomas 5-0-34-1
M. Riddle 3-0-16-1
A. Phillips 2-0-19-0