Weather dampens spirits and drenches leagues only unbeaten record…
Cricket; From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia - “Cricket is a sport played predominantly in the drier periods of the year. But, even so, the weather is a major factor in all cricket matches. A scheduled game of cricket cannot be played in wet weather. Dampness affects the bounce of the ball on the wicket and is a risk to all players involved in the game.”
There should be a caveat to this statement that reads something along the lines of; “But not in England and not in May”
I suppose the clue is in the equipment that we use. Wood and leather are notoriously un-happy creatures in the wet and so it transpired are Hampton Wick 2nd XI as they lost their unbeaten record to web-footed Farncombe.
It’s a horrible feeling, having done the usual thing and spent all week wishing the days away, desperately looking forward to a game of cricket, only to arrive at the ground and find that the weekends forecast had for once materialized. With the prospect of any play looking as bleak as that mythical area behind the trees and towards Hampton Court that seems grabs everyone’s attention the moment the word rain is mentioned, our thoughts soon turned to an afternoon playing Royal Cricket, Crazy Golf and Beer Pong.
Various attempts to remove our high-tech covers (!) at the slightest sight of any break in the cloud were thwarted by instant downpours and aggressive winds until approximately 1 hour and 24 minutes after the scheduled start time when umpire, Stephen Riley eventually called play. The long delay meant that the game was reduced to 38 over’s per side and suddenly thoughts were turned to working out what would be a competitive target in such atrocious conditions? Captain Fudge won a toss for the 1st time this season and we should have known there and then that this just wasn’t going to be our day.
With a member of the 2nd XI’s top 4 (who will remain nameless) currently courting a Sky Weather girl (who will remain nameless) we had inside knowledge into exactly what the weather would do for the remainder of the day. We had it on good authority that the day was destined to get better with brighter, dryer spells this afternoon leaving us with no option but to bowl first.
Webster and Lown took the new ball and whereas Lown struggled to find his length and gifted one opener full balls to ease through the covers, Webster was bang on the money and prompted the other opener to knick off to Cole at 1st slip. Despite Breakwell replacing Lown and grabbing no.2 well taken, by keeper Gates, Farncombe had got off to a flying start and suddenly with the ball starting to resemble a bar of imperial leather it was going to be crucial that the WICK took wickets at regular intervals to stem the flow and restrict the visitors to a total we could chase.
Fortunately we created these chances, unfortunately and uncharacteristically we were unable to take them. 4 catches were shelled that should have been taken and innings that should have been cut short were allowed extended sentences. Webster, Breakwell and Cole bowled with skill in difficult conditions but in limited over’s cricket you need more than 3 bowlers to shine and certainly fielders to back them up. 186/6 was a very decent score however if ever there was ever a week we could chase such a target in so few over’s this was surely the one with ample batting a small boundary and tough bowling conditions all in our favour.
I needn’t waste any column inches about tea, as you have all had your fair share and I don’t need to teach you lot to suck egg mayo. They are the best in the league (FACT) and thoroughly enjoyed by all opposition that visit Café DBW.
So on with the chase. The happily married Cole opened up with the WICKS most eligible bachelor Goulborn as we were looking for a positive start. Unfortunately like previous weeks our openers struggled to put away the bad ball and an all ready healthy rate was increasing sharply from as early as the 3rd over. Farncombe’s openers were brisk enough and were now benefiting from a dry ball and a lively deck. The ball wasn’t the only thing that swung as conditions were now in their favour and Goulborn would get bowled by a sharp ball nipping back from the impressive Bray.
Bray bowled with pace and bounce and welcomed skipper Fudge, to the crease with a barrage of short pitched stuff, most of which he ducked and weaved out of the way of until he was tempted into a hook and a top edge saw it carry to deep backward square. DOWN!! Fudgey who is happily settled down with his girlfriend of 4 years had received a let off. Could he go on and make Farncombe pay just as their batsman had done to us? No is answer and his failure to convert “another” decent start was compounded by the loss of Cole (C&B 19) and Sky TV contractor, Jackson (batting 4) to a 1st ball duck.
The WICK were reeling on 40/4. Crowther, fresh from his Caribbean exploits made heavy weather of things and failed to trouble the scorer and when Wright had lost another partner in Gates and he was left to bludgeon his way to 20 with just the last recognized batsman, Soppitt for company. The pair threatened to get a partnership going before a rusty Wright held out to mid-on. Cue utter frustration bought about by another change to conditions and a sudden shower that rendered the ball useless.
Suddenly the Farncombe attack that had looked threatening all afternoon was suffering the same fate as our own earlier in the day. Soppitt convinced the WICK tail to wag and first Breakwell and then Lown offered the experienced no. 8 valuable support. Farncombe were suddenly rendered clueless and one bowler (Honeywill) even resorted to baseball style pitching, but to the same null affect. Soppitt took full advantage and swept, pulled and scampered his way to 71*.
One WICK player asked the skipper, if he “had ever seen Soppitt bat this well before?” I replied “I have had the pleasure of watching this type of resilient performance for the last 17 years”. Soppitt is batsman who knows his limitations but also knows how to play a situation and score in his areas. His performance on Saturday should be a lesson to at least 4 of our top 7 batsman who returned an unsatisfactory 2 runs between them. The lesson read simply; Regardless of the amount of talent you have, if you don’t know your own game you are always going to struggle to convert talent into runs. I wouldn’t swap the talent in my batting line-up for any other in the league but quite simply, cricket is a game of stats and some of our players stats just don’t add up.
The WICK mustered a respectable 160/8 form their 38, a score that should have been good enough to win the game had we not shelled as many chances as we did.
Our first defeat of the season was a difficult one to take, but an easy one to explain, however still sitting in the automatic promotion places we go into the next 9 time games in a far healthier position than we were this time last year.
MOM – Soppitt
Soppitt (above) was unable to complete this week’s match report due to a sudden boom in the 2nd hand car market.
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