In its hey day, the beaches of Gadani were an amazing scene. Swarms of workers....mostly uneducated, unwashed and underpaid....descended upon the great behemoths of the ocean and reduced them to a tumble of scrap. The once mighty ships sitting upon the sandy shoreline, towering goliaths now stranded in unfamiliar territory and with their imperious majesty dented through this unexpected translocation, were no match for the tenacity, honed skill and greedy efficiency of their bustling predators. These men toiled day and night because they had nothing else. Their only role in life was find the biggest thing they could find and bring it down. On their brief spells away from the beach they appeared a rabble. An unsightly and disorganised bunch with few visible signs of civilised tendencies. The similarities with the Kilmington and Stourton bowling attack could only be more evident if the shipbreakers put on their whites before starting work.
The KSCC pace attack could be found, prior to the game, wandering up and down the Huish and Langport pitch looking for signs of weakness. At least this week it was without the powerhouse pre-game training rituals of North Curry making us look like guys out looking for the pub rather than a vaunted cricket side. Things looked....interesting. After the previous weeks blazing performance from his bowling unit, the Skipper elected to bowl upon winning the toss.
Tommy B opened up proceedings with a series of very tight overs. Getting back to full pace, the H+L openers were on the back foot from the beginning. Tommy threatened constantly and the only notable runs from his first 5 overs was a 4 that flew between keeper and slip. Taking a couple of overs to get settled, Snooky fell into his usual rhythm and began to build pressure. There is not much more to say about the next 10 overs except that they were superb. Those 10 overs contained 7 maidens and 3 wickets. Snooky earned his through an outside edge to Rayzzo and an lbw that was a perfect setup. Tommy B had a regulation slips catch sent to the safest hands in the business, those of his partner in crime The Strangler himself. From there, the innings never really recovered. A reluctant Missing in Action Harris (later to be found flirting with the local feline population while out sweeping the boundary) came onto bowl with pundits and team mates alike little surprised by another random turn from their enigmatic if slightly delusional leader. However, Sammy H proved he is more than just walking cat nip by producing a challenging little spell of trademark booming inswing and a wee bit of extra bounce. The extra bounce proved the difference, grabbing the wicket of their no. 4 thanks to a great take by Rayzzo. The endless stream of seamers then continued with The Other Tom and El Capitan. No Ball And No Boots Reid found the stumps but he had overstepped and then had a fairly easy chance put down by The Sheik, who still remains convinced that catching cricket balls may prevent him from entering Paradise. The Skipper had a couple of deliveries appear to go straight through the wickets, but unfortunately The Professor was off studying The Mutation of the Cornish Grass Fly in Cornish Campsites (to be found in his riveting summer blockbuster, Mutations I Found While On Holiday and 500 Other Things You May Not Find Interesting) over the weekend and was unavailable to give his professional opinion. But, finally, it was time to stop messing around and wheel out The Destroyer and The Golden Boy. Spence waltzed his way through the middle order and Freddie found prodigious turn. H+L tried to close up shop but you can’t keep out Spence when he is on his game. Despite giving the impression that his arm might fly off at any given point in time, he turned and twisted and roared in appeal, finding his way to a five-for that included an amusing slip catch to Snooker that came off the back of the batsman’s sweeping blade. Freddie’s wicket was part-skill-part-self-preservation as he took a blistering caught and bowled (rumours abound that The Chairman has refused to insure Golden Boys face and hair for £5mil as Freddie demands). H+L were all out for 83 in a slow 38 overs. One third of the overs were maidens and every wicket was a bowlers wicket (bowled, lbw, caught behind, caught slip, caught and bowled)....no fielders required thanks!
The reply was started with Your Brave Leader(TM) and everyone’s favourite permanent student, Charlie Pelham. The early going was slow and steady with the basic plan of keeping out the dangerous Shillabeer, who was busy giving Master Pelham a right working over, and sort the runs out from the other end. Things were meandering along quite nicely with the odd boundary. Charlie played a sumptuous cover drive off Shillabeer and El Capitan unsurprisingly cut him for four. H+L needed to change things up and brought on the spinner. In an odd turn of events, The Skipper didn’t try to deposit him into cow corner and the chase continued at a comfortable pace. However, the sedate pace of proceedings was thrown out the window by Charlie. A bowling change from Shillabeer’s end saw a transformation in the young bounder...walking down the wicket and solidly driving the first ball for four...then repeating the dose again and then again in the next couple of balls. The party continued in the next over as he deposited the spinner for 6,0,2,4,2 to wrap up the game. He’d left his Skipper for dead and so it is a real shame that El Capitan forgot to write the report in the Blackmore Vale and his only hope of anyone in the distant future discovering this wonderful achievement is that his captain wins some kind of literary prize for incomprehensible drivel.
It was a huge win, setup first by our seamers and then driven home by the spin twins. They were never in the game and it gave us the opportunity to get down the pub nice and early. It was also a great win in that we thrust ourselves up into the 3rd on the table (taking into account our extra game) and severely dented H+L’s promotion push.
Well done lads!
Bowling: o m r w
S Churchill 7.4 2 8 5
S Snook 8 4 21 2
T Barton 7 4 10 1
F Barton 6 2 11 1
S Harris 3 1 7 1
C Hansen 2 0 3 0
T Reid 5 0 18 0
Batting:
C Pelham 48*
C Hansen 28*
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