Warwick 3rd XI (H) 162-10 (45.3) def. by Loughborough 4th XI (A) 163-1 (36.0) by 9 wickets
Full Scorecard
Match Report A: The 3s played Loughborough 4s. We batted first and got 162. They chased it down. Red arse was played. Everyone went home.
Match Report B: Monday the 21st of May saw top of the league Loughborough 4s take on the UWMCC 3s on a beautiful day at El Stadion del Cryfield. Despite Captain Riley only giving 24 hours’ notice to the cohort of clubmen selected, a strong team was put out nonetheless, with Roche, Bird, Timmo and Curtis dropping down from the 2s, Rav finally making his BUCS debut 3 weeks into the season, and Amogh, Ollie C, Riley, Dan Reed, Rahul and Suchin making up the rest of the boys.
Things got off to a good start. With the meet time set at 11.45, Amogh messaged Rav at 11.45: “Rav can you get the keys for the pavilion mate, running a bit late”: standard. Curtis also informed us that he had “abdominal pains stemming from food poisoning”, also known as “the shits”, but luckily he managed to pull through last minute. Warwick Sport, known as avid fans of cricket, handily decided not to prepare the ground properly in time, claiming they had received no notice of a BUCS fixture to be played. Nevertheles
s, a hastily curated Lakeside pitch awaited both teams, with the groundsman encouraging the boys to ignore complaints made by the umpires and opposition as he ‘couldn’t do much more’. Luckily, no complaints were made, partly because the pitch and outfield played relatively well, and also because both parties couldn’t be arsed to fill out the questionnaire anyway.
Like most of the game, the warm-up was relatively unremarkable. We started off with some 4 vs 4 footie, with team fresh taking on team old; team fresh using their youthfulness to take a 5-1 win. Roachy’s daily exercise limit of 5 minutes was also reached during this period. Rav also took his catches, perhaps a sign of things to come? Riley won the toss and on a flat deck, decided to have a bat. Unfortunately, this would be the only victory of the day.
Timmo and in form Amogh (Games played: 1, Runs Scored: 0) opened the batting and Amogh, true to his form, decided to get another duck to keep his “unique” run scoring record intact and stress out essentially every clubman taking part in this year’s fantasy (update – Games played: 2, Runs scored: 0). Birdy, fresh from a half-ton made for the 2s the previous week came in, and he and Timmo looked to see off the openers. However, some tight bowling from the Lboro openers combined with a slight lack of application saw us 30-3 off not very many.
Run machine Riley and Carter steadied the ship nicely, with both looking good to making decent totals. However, this was not meant to be, first Carter fell, and then Riley, in rather comical circumstances, to a short ball from the Lboro spinner. What should have happened is Riley dispatching the half tracker to the boundary. Instead however, Cryfield worked its mysterious ways once again, as the ball decided not to bounce at all, Riley therefore bowled by a two bounce yorker.
Reed and Rahul tried to counter attack but both were unable to sustain their aggression, with Reed being given out stumped off a seamer (who by the way had the longest run up ever known to mankind, even one of their own players said it was like watching someone run a marathon) by Randall’s favourite bucket hat wearing blind umpire. Roche continued the aggressive approach, making a quick 30, however wickets continued falling and UWMCC were eventually all out for 162, far below par. Meanwhile off the field, a dog and a child ran onto the pitch, Thor got his rig out (sake) and Curtis went for a 20 minute shit.
After an enjoyable Jin’s lunch, the two teams were ready to slug it out once more. Roche and Curtis were handed the ball and both looked to work their channels to create chances. Curtis particularly bowled well in his early overs with 2 maidens bowled in a row, a fact that Rahul decided to remind the Lboro openers of. This then resulted in the number 1 pulling Curtis for 6. Unlucky Rahul. Ollie and Suchin then tried their luck but once again, chances were hard to come by, although a tough one at gully was put down by Timmo. Bird decided to do his best Bavuma impression with an attempted pick up and mid-air throw at the stumps but instead what occurred was Bird tripping himself up and doing the ‘Salmon Dive’ FIFA celebration (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5eYcuWvv3VI). Very nice work indeed.
Meanwhile Rav seemed to have been possessed by the spirit of Jonty Rhodes as he literally became a ball magnet – nothing would go past him, to the amazement of his teammates and the 5 people watching on the sideline. But then it all came crashing down when Rav decided to let one through his legs the absolute mong. Back to square one. Spin came on and this finally resulted in the first wicket with Rahul getting the batsman to chip one to Curtis, who claimed he couldn’t see the ball despite catching it. Rav came on at the other end, and both bowlers tied up the Lboro batsman. Unfortunately however, with little runs to play with, the batsman were able to bat relatively risk free meaning once more, chances were few and far between. They eventually reached their target with 14 overs to spare and 9 wickets in hand, ending a poor day for the 3s.
The post-match meeting was pretty frank, as the boys discussed what could have been done better over the course of the game. There’s no doubt that vast improvements are required in order to turn this season into a positive one. Nevertheless, the boys left the ground in decent spirits, with fines dished out and a rogue game of dog’s arse/red arse/headers and volleys (depending on what region of the UK you come from) ensuing. We learnt from this that most UWMCC clubmen cannot kick a ball, and Thor especially needs to work on his heading ability. All in all however, as said above, it was a disappointing day with much improvement required.
(s/o @DarbadosFresh xxx)