Four hundred and thirty runs were scored for the loss of six wickets in forty overs. Next time we shall follow the advice of Evelyn Waugh (quoting, I think, one of the Chinese sages whose words are put under the doors of the Australian team), and put out more flags. And further away. With reasonable length boundaries our greater hitting power and less bad bowling would have told, but as it was the darkness settled the issue.

James and Kevin began relatively sedately, at around seven an over. At this stage the bowling was pretty good, although the fielding of Bath Knights was less impressive. After a while James scooped a return catch, and five balls later, when the over ended, Luke had 22. The three sixes, off his first, second and fourth balls, all went a long way over the boundary. Kevin couldn't match that, but he didn't really have to. He kept the quicker bowlers out, and Luke blasted everything else to infinity. The Bath Knights captain, after being one the receiving end for half an over, announced his intention to bowl underarm. Gregory intervened and drew attention to Law 24.1(b) which (absurdly, perhaps) forbids this. Soon after that Kevin had his off stump removed by the best ball of the match. Mark never settled and went the same way, and Luke, just short of his fifty, hit a surprisingly gentle catch to cover. But Duncan also hit his first ball for six. This would have been an amazing shot even if he had been in for half an hour. It was a back-foot flick that went over mid-on. But it has to be said that with sensible boundaries it would have been worth four at most. Andy's correctness was probably a disadvantage to him. He kept the ball on the ground, thereby costing himself two runs every time he got a bad ball, which was often. But he made 84 not out very rapidly, so nobody was complaining. The final over was slightly disappointing, but we thought 214 would be enough.

We didn't think it would be plenty. We always knew that if two or even one batsman with a good eye got in, good balls would go for six; and that is exactly what happened. Gregory bowled fairly tidily, but as well-placed pushes would go for four before anybody could move to them, even that meant eight an over. Rob, with an even shorter boundary behind him, was more expensive. We let a few through in the field (no more than they had), including an embarrassing moment when the captain failed to get a hand on a relatively straightforward catch.

Steve Penrose's first over was very expensive but Duncan noticed that there wasn't actually anything wrong with it and persisted. By this time field-placing had become a one-dimensional problem as all the fieldsmen were permanently on the boundary. So when one of the batsmen sent a high catch towards cover Steve, the bowler, had to go after it himself. He caught it well. He explained later that as it was coming out of the sky, which was still light, he could see it

Indeed the darkness was becoming a serious problem. The batsmen could more or less see the ball because at least they knew it was coming their way, but in the deep it was hard to pick it up. Kevin removed the new batsman first ball, but got a lot of stick after that; and only Duncan and, briefly, James, could keep things at all quiet. The darkness deepened, and somewhere in it they made enough runs; but nobody really knows what happened exactly, as nobody could see.