Kilmington vs The Venturers, Sunday 29th
April 2007
Author: Gregory Sankaran
Lost by 38 runs. Kilmington 217-8 Venturers 179
For some reason, when aliens visit Earth, they go to Warminster. Or so it is claimed. Exactly why they do this, given that they can presumably go where they like, is a mystery. The cricket ground at Kilmington, a few miles away, would be a much better choice: it is quiet and green, and the humans are friendly. Perhaps their radar isn't up to it. It's not the easiest ground to find.
We all did find it, though, and the match started on time with a maiden from Paul Snow. Duncan was also hard to get away, and although Paul's accuracy decreased it was not long before one of the batsmen got frustrated and popped a catch back to Paul. He looked a bit surprised, but caught it anyway. The second-wicket pair were harder to dislodge. Paul was replaced by Steve, but his radar operates on the same wavelength as the aliens' and he kept sending the ball off in the direction of Warminster. After three overs of this Paul Wilson took him to our leader, who took him off, and he spent the rest of the afternoon happily drawing circles on the outfield. Before then, though, Rob Taylor had taken the second wicket, and we had committed our only really serious fluff in the field. Rob, and Duncan earlier, had had two or three close LBW appeals turned down by the elderly Kilmingtonian who was umpiring, but this time he nodded slowly three times in the manner of Steve Bucknor, and gave the batsman out. He was probably right. But a few balls before there had been a drastic mix-up which should have given us the wicket of the remaining opener, who was looking dangerous. Richard's throw was quick enough, but arrived very low, and Toby scuffed it away with the batsman just short of his ground.
The batsman who arrived at the fall of the second wicket was female. A couple of years ago one Venturers player greeted the sight of a woman on a cricket field much as if she had been one of the Warminster aliens (and promptly got out to her) but the strenuous campaign of re-education and consciousness-raising that has gone on since then has been so successful that this time even Andy didn't so much as stand up from the stile he was sitting on at the midwicket boundary. Andy had been put out there because by now Gregory was bowling, and he was sitting grumpily on the stile because he wasn't bowling himself. The question of greatest interest was whether he knew that the fence was electrified, and what would happen when he found out. We never got the answer, though, because it had been turned off. Kilmington play league cricket, and in the league electrocuting the outfielders is a Level Three offence, nearly as serious as wearing the wrong advertising and punishable by a range of measures up to and including withdrawal of the right to non-UHT milk in the tea.
If we accepted her as a cricketer, however, that meant we were going to try to get her out. We did this in a startling way. She scooped a ball from Gregory uppishly towards Rob at short cover. It wasn't a catch, but in trying to make it into one he misfielded and she set off instantly for a single. Gregory ambled briskly after the escaping ball, picked it up and in two or three rather jerky movements took aim at the one-and-a-half stumps he could see and calmly threw her out at the non-striker's end. The mood of the side changed abruptly. Andy fell off his stile. Paul Wilson started a monologue about the merits of fielding practice. Others clustered round with tape measures, protractors, theodolites and so on, trying to work out what had happened. It is, indeed, a while since Gregory ran someone out with a direct hit. In fact, it is a while since any Venturers fieldsman ran someone out with a direct hit. Maybe we should do it again.
A couple of overs later we made further progress: the new batsman scooped Gregory a simple return catch and his successor was undone by a ball that turned fractionally and bounced not at all, hitting off stump about three inches up after pitching on a good length. The left-hander who came next also got a couple of such deliveries in the next few overs, but dug them out and he and the opener, still there, settled. Gregory mostly bowled tidily, though he did drop short twice to to the left-hander, and the opener never got him away but had more success against Paul Wilson, who bowled a tight line but occasionally strayed in length. When Paul did get the length right he also caused considerable trouble, and Duncan left both bowlers on. The scoring rate never varied much from five an over: as long as we could prevent acceleration, we should have an attainable target.
With this in mind, the opener announced rather loudly to his partner that Gregory wasn't turning it and "had to go". Then he tried to hit the next ball to somewhere far away, probably Warminster; but Gregory was turning it, and he had to go himself, bowled leg stump. His successor did hit the first ball of Gregory's last over, which was a perfectly good one, for a straight six, but then tapped the second, which was short and wide, weakly into Rob's hands. Paul had no such luck. He, Matt and Duncan accidentally peppered the new batsman, a harmless enthusiast, with a variety of short ones and full tosses: the batsman took this in good part, recognising that they weren't doing it on purpose but were simply getting tired. Eventually Duncan bowled him, but we never did get rid of the left-hander in spite of Gregory's liking for bowling to them. Right at the end Roger dropped him on the boundary, but it was too late to have made any difference.
They had made 217 for 8, slightly more than we had hoped, but Roger and Richard did exactly what was needed, maintaining five an over without taking serious risks. They had put on nearly fifty, and seemed untroubled, when Richard tried to pull a ball that perhaps kept a little low and was bowled off his pads. The low bounce was the main threat. Andy found it hampered him, too, but he picked off the bad balls and he and Roger kept going at the same steady rate. We were doing rather well; but then Andy got another low one and incurred the Steve Bucknor impression. The innings started to fall apart. The import from Warminster (oo-er) women's CC amply revenged her run-out with half-a-dozen overs of absolutely harmless but annoyingly accurate medium pace, which we treated with excessive respect. Perhaps a course of re-re-education and some consciousness-lowering is needed. Unable to get any runs at her end, both Rob and Duncan slogged to mid-off at the other end.
Roger, however, was still all right. If he could have found a partner we could have done what they did, lose wickets steadily but keep scoring. But each new batsman started slowly, and then Roger himself got another case of three-inch bounce from a good length. By the thirtieth over the match had all but gone.
Matt dropped anchor, but with Roger's departure the need was for quick runs. Paul Wilson supplied a few, but was no luckier than when he bowled, chopping a cut into his leg stump (the low bounce contributed again). Toby briefly raised hopes but the run rate was climbing, and when he was out there was nothing more to be done. Steve hit one boundary, Matt and Paul Snow were obstinate, and Gregory blocked the only straight ball he faced; but obstinacy and blocking were no use, and we gradually subsided.