Scorecard

Marldon v Erratics Cricket Club Erratics on Sun 22 Aug 2021 at 1.00pm
Erratics Cricket Club Lost by 75 Runs

Match report Match report by Martin Wright.

At one point in this ill-starred match, the Marldon wicket keeper carefully scooped up a wandering toad that had strayed onto the pitch and carried it to safety. For the Erratics, there was to be no such escape.

It started so promisingly. We arrived to find a Marldoneer mowing the grass in a neat oval around the square. (The grass stayed longer in the outfield, else Marldon wouldn’t be Marldon.) And our Erratisweaters had arrived. Thick and woolly. I was going to say ‘like my judgement of a run’, but that would be far too obvious.

It carried on promisingly when Skipper Kirby lost the toss and we were in the field. Ben Youngman was on the money as ever these days, testing and probing and giving nothing away and despatching one of the openers. At the other end, Oscar Cammack was lively and hostile, and, with the outfield dampening down the value per shot ratio, Marldon were slow to get going. Duncan Chave bowled a rare spell, and even rarer was the fact he got through it without pain. Ironically, given what followed. He picked up a couple of wickets, as did Phil Power – a tad more expensive after Marldon’s excellent young No. 3 took a liking to his more generously pitched deliveries. Phil had his revenge at the death, clean bowling him (with what Ben less generously described as “a slow long-hop”). Siva Subramanian turned his arm over too, with varying success, but also snaffled a wicket. But the pick of the bowlers for sheer miserliness was Fraser Chave, who proved almost ungetawayable, with an economy rate of less than one per over.

Jonathan was Forrester-esque in his tidiness behind the stumps, doing some fine takes, including off a couple of imaginary edges which only he heard, along with one entirely unimagined stumping.

A late flurry of hitting saw Marldon surge their total to 166 – which by consensus was more than par for a slow pitch and a Marldony outfield.

Still and all – four an over. Shouldn’t be impossible. As Duncan put it: “Just pick off the singles.”

“Bugger that”, thought opener Jonathan Beverley, as he hammered a couple of fours, and we were away - little realising that this would be pretty much the bright spot of our batting. JB crunched another belligerent blow straight to a fielder, and I joined Duncan at the crease. Duncan was looking entirely Duncan-ish: composed, watchful, playing himself in before what would surely have been an innings of measured acceleration culminating in some elegantly ruthless strokeplay.

It should here be recorded that there are occasions when Duncan and I can bat together without me inflicting either cricketing death or serious injury on him. That we have even put on fifty and more without so much as a flicker of disaster. That our running between the wickets has been silky smooth and risk-free - OK, I’m drifting into the realms of fantasy now. I just wanted to make the point that there are days when it doesn’t end in complete catastrophe.

Today was not such a day.

I played the ball wide of cover and called for a run. Duncan started to respond “with a little skip” as he later put it, and then, to my horror and much more to his, collapsed in a heap, clearly in pain. A torn calf or Achilles – we wait to hear. Marldon gracefully declined to run him out, and he limped off in some agony, a wounded soldier. It was sickening to see, and it seemed to knock the stuffing out of our batting.

I faffed around disconsolately for a bit before punting a full toss to square leg. Siva holed out and Mark was bowled. Oscar took a more robust approach, striking the ball well from the start until he too was cleaned up by one of Marldon’s many naggingly accurate bowlers, who made short work of Phil and Penny, while Jonathan was unfortunate to brush the bails off with his gloves as he attempted a pull to a ball that stopped on him.

Fraser, surveying the carnage from the other end, held Marldon at bay with some gritty defence, and then, in partnership with Ben, dealt some face-saving blows when the change bowlers came on. Ben launched a wonderful straight six of the sort I dream of striking, and together they took us through to our full 40 overs and a score of 91 – a little over half of the target.

Jonathan made what I took to be a hari-kiri gesture, although whether he was suggesting that he perform this on himself as the Captain Responsible (which would be wholly inappropriate, given the way he stuck to his task in the field with his customary vigour), or (much more apt) that I might like to do so with a rusty carving knife on my return home, wasn’t immediately clear.

Credit must go to Marldon for the sort of tigerish fielding which can cramp any batsman’s style, and for relentlessly tight bowling which made the best use of the slow pitch.

Afterwards, at the Church House Inn, there was much speculative slavering over the promise of triple-cooked chips, but they didn’t really live up to their billing. Single at best, we decided, perhaps unfairly. But the one thing that had, undeniably, been triple-cooked today - was us.



Marldon Batting
Player name RunsMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
3w 6b  
for 6 wickets
9
166 (40.0 overs)		     
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

Erratics Cricket Club Erratics Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Ben Youngman8.0212112.001.50
Oscar Cammack7.003100.004.43
Duncan Chave7.0034217.004.86
Fraser Chave8.02700.000.87
Phil Power8.0057228.507.13
Sivaraman Subramanian2.0017117.008.50

Erratics Cricket Club Erratics Batting
Player Name RMB4s6sSRCatchesStumpingsRun outs
extras
TOTAL :
10nb 2w 4b  
for 8 wickets
16
91		        
Duncan Chave Retired Not Out  3 18 16.67 1
Jonathan Beverley Caught  8 9 2 88.89
Martin Wright Caught  4 35 11.43
Sivaraman Subramanian Caught  0 4 0 2
Mark Phillips Bowled  0 2 0
Fraser Chave Not Out  28 97 3 28.87
Oscar Cammack Bowled  8 12 1 66.67
Jonathan Kirby Bowled  4 15 1 26.67 1
Phil Power Bowled  0 8 0 1
Penny Price Caught  1 9 11.11
Ben Youngman Not Out  19 31 3 1 61.29

Marldon Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
No records to display.