Bushmen 33-3
(Clark 2-17) - match abandoned due to rain
It was a dark and forboding winters day over the Heath...well OK it
wasn't winter but it might as well have been, at least then 11 idiots
dressed in white wouldn't have spent it standing in a field getting wet.
The North Sea shipping forecast predicted "Wind in northeast, east and
southeast 5 to 7, increasing gale 8 or severe gale 9 for a time, squally
showers throughout" about 750 miles south west of that at Headley Heath
the weather was about the same.
Clarky had called skipper Pickering at midnight from a bar of disrepute
to confirm he couldn't find any other players for the game. The
crimson tinge to his face clearly indicated an elevated blood pressure
from one to many cheeky ones the night before, that and the fact he
stank of pure gin and couldn't speak properly certainly did not engender
any faith that his bowling would be any good at all.....
So as the light drizzle continued to get heavier Clarky opened at one
end and delivered what was arguably the finest opening over he has
bowled for many a year. A mistimed drive off a ball that
held a little in the sponge layer cake posing as a pitch saw a simple
catch taken by Waller at short extra cover and Bushmen were 1 for no
score.
The left-arm-over Mearns provided the perfect foil at the other end
beating the outer edge of the bat and frustrating the scoring of the
Bushmen. Clarky's fourth over saw the downfall of the Bushmens
number three who played all around a straight one leaving a gate wider
than the door to an aircraft hangar. When Mearn's finally caught
the outside edge off a drive it was pouched safely by Hughes at second
slip and to a passer by, for that one delivery, the standard of cricket
on the Heath must have looked very high.
Clarky continued to frustrate the scoring, the fact the opening bat had
stapled his backfoot to the crease didn't help him score. Conan (Waller)
replaced the knackered Mearns and was very unfortunate not have taken a
wicket when a clear inside edge off the opening bat was pouched by the
keeper but the umpire didn't give it, thinking the sound was the bat
hitting the ground. The Conan/Clarke combination was as miserly
as the Mearns/Clarke pairing and by the 22nd over the Bushmen had only scored
30 runs.
Bassi had inexplicably turned out in sunglasses (perhaps a tad
optimistically or he was trying to add a touch of Bollywood glamour to the
proceedings) and at the 20 over mark the horizontal rain took its
first victim when George Tyson (last weeks batting hero) was rushed to
hospital suffering from frostbite and mild hypothermia.
Clarky was bowling so well that skipper Pickering was having trouble
in replacing him until Patel suggested "let the old git bowl till he
collapses". But before the imminent Clarky collapse, logic and
sense prevailed when the batsmen (much to the relief of the fielders)
decided to see out the rain and wind from the warmth of the pavilion.
An early tea was taken to try and save time later in the day but it was
in vain, the incessant rain was exactly that and by 4pm the game was
declared abandoned. The Bushmen were spared the ignominy of scoring the
lowest ever total at one of the smallest grounds in Surrey.
After the game, Clarky commented "Thart warsh the besht I've bowled [hic]
for shixx sheashons,......bloody rain.... God hates me...." before passing
out in the pavilion.
A frustrated Pickering added "We
had them on the ropes today. At that run rate they were only going
to score 60 by tea and I have every confidence that with our depth in
bowling and batting we would have let them back into it and made a game
of it. To me, it doesn't matter how good you are, sport is all
about playing and competing. Whatever you do in cricket and in sport,
enjoy it, be positive and try to win, and that's what we did today, I'm
proud of my boys."
Go to man Conan was too busy (whispering sweet nothings into his girlfriend's
ear in the pavilion) to
comment.
