Kilmington vs Venturers, Sunday June 28th

Kilmington 239-2 Venturers 150-odd for 9

Kilmington usually produce many familar faces and a few we have not seen before. This time they had an Alastair Cook lookalike and a dramatically bearded Australian. The Alastair Cook lookalike opened the batting, but right-handed, with the familiar Spence, and the Australian kept wicket, which he had apparently not done for many years. Neither had our wicket-keeper, Simon S, obliged to put on the gloves in the absence of both Alex C and Roger. Putting on the gloves was the hard part, because they were not in the kit bag where they were supposed to have been left and we had to borrow a pair from the opposition.

It was a long time before we got any wickets at all, but we kept the runs reasonably scarce. There were a few wides as the bowlers struggled to control the swinging ball, and the Cookalike had a narrow escape when he let a ball from Simon T go, expecting it to leave him, and watched it pass just over the top of his off stump. Nigel induced some uppish shots but a spectacular stop by Fluffy in the gully was as good as it got. Ian G also had a go with the ball but found no control, although when he did get one in the right place it was very awkward for the batsman. Gregory and Saurabh had even less luck but perhaps also did less to deserve luck, being occasionally expensive. Saurabh might have won an LBW decision but the bounce probably raised too much doubt. The Cookalike looped a drive towards Andy at mid-off, who appeared not to see it; but the only clear chance came off Gregory's second ball, which found the edge of both Spence's bat and whoever's gloves it was that Simon S was wearing. The innings was more than half over by the time Gregory bowled Spence. The new batsman also looped a drive towards Andy, but although both he and the bowler saw it perfectly it was precisely, if accidentally, directed between them and just out of the reach of both. That wasn't so expensive: he soon gave a second chance, which we dropped, and a third, which Ian G caught. The Cookalike, playing well by now, retired on reaching three figures, but not before he had fallen over entirely in trying to obliterate a ball from Andy, which fortunately for him was not quite straight. Indeed Andy proved very hard to hit and he, Simon D and Alex kept the score just within reasonable bounds, despite more dropped catches.

To get to 240 we needed, at the very least, a solid start and something energetic from Ian G. The first problem was a familiar one known as Emily, who plays a good standard of women's cricket and bowls accurate medium pace. Most of us who can bat at all rely on inaccuracy for scoring opportunities, so that sort of thing is a menace. Even so, Simon T was unlucky to get out to her the way he did, a good leg-side catch by the surprised Australian. Immediately the innings started to disintegrate: Ian G swiped across the line at the other end and was bowled, Fluffy and Nigel miscued, Tom missed and our chances were gone. It wasn't a complete collapse: everybody made a few, but the target was out of range. Andy hit a few robust blows and the innings was given some superficial respectability by the remaining two of the three left-handed Simons, who added fifty rather quickly for the ninth wicket and outscored everybody else in the team. Finally, Gregory blocked out for the non-existent draw again .

Fixtures & Results 2009