Game 2: Old Estonians vs. See You Next Tuesday's

 
May 10th 2011
Success, however loosely defined, is a funny thing. Generally speaking, it keeps smiles on faces and egos ticking over and accounts in the red and all those other important things that make the world go round. Occasionally though, it loves nothing more than chucking a ruddy great spanner right in the works. Faced with a situation where previously you have found only triumph, you may now feel the artificial rush of confidence that is a product of your prior success. You stare the situation straight in the eye and feel confident receiving its gaze. Unflappable. Bullish. Ready to succeed again. It is in instances like this that you can put your absolute last shekel on the fact you are going to get out for a golden duck. On Tuesday evening, I am unhappy to report that success definitively showed me who is boss.

After last week's excellent result, spirits were high within the team upon meeting (on time!) at Regents Park. Morale was further lifted by the fetching light blue shirts that had eventually wriggled their way through a particularly rigorous effort on the part of the UK Borders and Customs agency, and were ready for their first appearance of the season. It was first come first served on the shirt sizes, and once Mick and I had snaffled the two available mediums, it was left for the unfortunate Paul and Henry to don the XXLs, giving them the unfavourable ability to catch the wind and tack gracefully towards the boundary, should they turn in slightly the wrong direction. Henry's oversized shirt was the least of his problems, however. Having been unexpectedly called in to work during the afternoon, he had somehow contrived to forget his entire kitbag, meaning he played the game in a pair of lightweight canvas lace-ups and a snazzy pair of grey chinos; a sartorial beacon in an ocean of itchy polyester.

The evening's opponents, the 100% Australian "See You Next Tuesday's" numbered precisely two when the toss was made, and won, by Old Estonians. Naturally, with the opposition having only two fielders, I did the sporting thing and made them bowl first, hoping to exploit the myriad gaps resulting from our batsmen having no one other than a bowler and a wicket keeper to negate. Unfortunately, my plans were quickly dashed with the arrival of six other strapping Aussies, and despite one of their order having some significant bother with the waistband on his shorts, SYNT were at full strength by the start of the game.

Last week's opening partnership Mick and James got off to a slow start, hampered by an outfield that had a higher sand content than most English beaches and enough grass to feed an entire herd of Bison. In addition to the slow outfield, they were also (literally) hamstrung when Mick energetically set off for his first single only to twang a muscle in his thigh and spend the next fifteen minutes hobbling singles that he would have normally made into twos. The first eight overs yielded only 40 runs and no boundaries and at this stage, SYNT were definitely on top.

Time to cast your mind back to the beginning of this entry. Imagine, if you will, my self-confidence as the water in a metaphorical goldfish bowl. After last week's innings which I quite honestly described at the time as "scratchy" but has somehow in the intervening week been elevated in my mind to be on a par with Afridi’s blistering debut century versus Sri Lanka and Chris Gayle’s fearsome heroics in this year’s IPL, you can imagine that there was barely any room in said goldfish bowl for the fish, such was it brimming with water. Or confidence. Or whatever the metaphor is. Anyway, when Mick was eventually bowled by one which kept suspiciously low, I took guard at the crease fearing nothing, especially not the slightly toothy Bruce eyeing me up from 30 yards away. Suffice it to say that toothy Bruce slung down a very tidy delivery which was much quicker than I was expecting and all I could do was feather it tamely to the grateful keeper. Such was the brevity of my innings, as I sloped off I practically caught up with Mick still making his limpy way off the pitch. There’s a lesson to be learned here everyone: always remember your limitations. Mine are evidently picking the length, and a grasp on reality.

With things looking somewhat bleak at 50-2 from the first ten overs, James quickly upped his scoring and soon retired 51 not out with only 65 on the board, which gave even clearer indication of how the runs had been shared around to that point. Somewhat unexpectedly, Old E’s started to get on top of the bowling attack a little, with Henry smashing ten off five balls, the highlight of his innings coming as two SYNT fielders, running for the same ball spiralling in the skies way above them, somehow conspired to collide with each other and miss the ball completely. It’s possible that they were distracted by Paul’s shout of “COLLIDE!” from the boundary, but we can’t say for sure. With Henry freshly departed having nicked one to the keeper, Paul and Tom set about getting the Old E’s innings back on track. Tom was doing his best Paul Collywood impression with bunted twos into the on side and some remarkably effective strokemaking from the shorter, sharper stuff, always keeping the scoreboard ticking over. Paul meanwhile was enhancing his reputation as Old Estonians’ loose cannon – after his tactically magnificent utilisation of the double-bouncing leg spinner last week, this week he dug deep into the batting textbook and pulled out the absolute gem pictured below (note ball spiralling off to backward point boundary). We can’t conclusively tell from the photo but we had a good chat about it and have agreed by committee that Paul’s eyes were definitely closed.

"The Arthur" - MCC Batting Textbook, Chapter 9, p212.

With 100 passed and Tom utilising the range of shots he developed on the testing nine yard wicket in his back garden (four to the fence, out if it lands in the shrubbery) things were starting to look a bit rosier and thoughts of 150 started to form in my head. Unfortunately, Paul departed to a sharp catch and Andy Biggadike fell first ball (“Too good for me, that one” – yeah, know the feeling), and it was left to Tom to galvanise a whippet-like Dom into ticking over as many runs in the last two overs as possible. The highlight of the closing spell being the single that Tom called milliseconds after the ball had left the bowlers hand and before Dom had even had a chance to think about hitting it. Luckily, Dom left it well alone, the wicketkeeper did likewise as he was surely confused to see Tom physically racing the ball down the pitch, and we picked up four byes as a result. Top tactics from Mr Martin. Dom eventually ran himself out for a heroic 0, and the innings closed with 129 on the board and Tom undefeated on an excellent 39.

After a quick turnaround, Paul took the new ball to try and recreate his double bouncing form of the previous week. Despite bowling a good line, they SYNT batsmen were able to pick up two early boundaries, so it was just as well that Andy bowling the second over was right on the money from his first ball, beating the outside edge of the batsmen with good bounce off the pitch. The pressure exerted by Andy took its toll in his very first over, one lifting off the seam and catching the outside edge before slamming into my gloves, meaning that despite the golden duck, I’m still yet to drop a catch this season (stay tuned next week folks!).

Paul’s second over was tighter but remained wicketless despite an excellent attempted catch at deep square leg from the airborne James, and so with Andy still scorching down lightning bolts in his next over, Dom came on to join the bowling party. The next four overs passed for just 16 runs with the bowling team definitely on top; these two really starting to announce themselves as the premier partnership in the league.

With Dom’s final two overs saved for the death, part time gravity-defier and full time run-machine Yandell took the ball and was unlucky not to take a wicket with his first ball, the ball hitting the same dead patch as had done for Mick in the first innings and skidding through at shin height below the hearty swish of Aussie willow. With the run rate rising, the pressure got to the batsman, and having swatted one of James’ flatter deliveries through midwicket, the striker immediately set off for two, with Tom chasing the ball down as it neared the boundary. Due to the somewhat arable outfield, the ball slowed up much quicker than expected, and a lightning fast turn and throw from Tom saw one batsman turn back and one keep going, meaning when they looked up, they were surprised to find they were stood at the same end, and I had the simple task of collecting the ball on the bounce and taking off the bails.

Henry took over the bowling from Dom and found immediate swing with the slightly older white ball, hooping it away from the batsman who so in the dark about where the ball had gone that they might as well have been wearing blindfolds and trying to pin some driving points on Chris Huhne. Despite beating the edge on numerous occasions, Henry strayed onto the pads too often and the batsmen began to tick off the runs they needed to chase the Old E’s total.

Some Yardy-esque spears by utility man Tom in his first over swung things marginally back in our favour, but with James finding himself unfortunate to get on the wrong end of a boundary lashing in his third over and a couple of skied chances which didn’t quite go to hand, we eventually found ourselves with only eight to defend from the last ten balls.

Never one to admit defeat, the newly returned Dom suggested bringing in a short fielder on the leg side, announcing he was about to deliver some “sweet chin music” to the batsman. With none of us any the wiser about what he was trying to do, the ball slipped from his grasp at the critical moment and flew, Harmison like, through the second slip area where the combination of my flailing right glove and a well-positioned Mick on the boundary at third man were all that stopped the thunderbolt disappearing into the undergrowth. Undeterred, Dom’s next ball was even quicker, but unfortunately sliced off the edge of the swinging blade and flew for six over the backward point boundary. We’d been beaten with eight balls to spare, and the nagging feeling that we were probably 20 runs short in setting a total had been borne out in the chase.

Still, there were a lot of good things to take a disappointing result; Eltham’s finest James and Tom had batted excellently to amass 70% of the Old E’s runs, Paul had shown a beautiful line in comic timing as he narrated the fielding blunders of SYNT, and Andy Biggadike’s excellent economy rate of 4.25 saw him rise to seventh in the league bowling rankings at the close of play. The best news of all however, was that after receiving two bonus points for our close defeat, Old E’s found themselves top of the league after two games played. With next week’s opponents Griffin Cricket Club firmly in our sights, we were looking forward to keeping it that way.

Stats from Game 2 are available on the Last Man Stands website - click here.