I was fielding at cover, when Mr Hartley walked over from gully halfway through an over.
“Tim, my knee is shot. I’ll try one more over off my short run, but it’s not looking good”.
He bowled one more over, turned to me, and shook his head.
Losing Mr Hartley’s bowling at the best of times is dreadful news, as he guarantees going at under 2 an over and will normally pick up a couple of wickets. But today was worse.
I looked from Mr Hartley to Northy. Northy was sat on the boundary with his leg up. Pulled a hamstring in his second over. Couldn’t bowl. I then looked to Shaheen. Bad back, couldn’t bowl. I then looked to the scoreboard, which told me we had only 138 runs to defend.
This was going to be a tough afternoon.
Earlier on, myself and Chalky had opened the batting versus South Woodham Ferrers. We got off to our usual slow but solid start, getting to about 60 off 20, which is where we like to be, before I got out for 27.
What followed was a steady trickle of wickets, as man after man got out trying to play an aggressive shot. Fair play to South Woodham Ferrers, they took some very good catches, but we shouldn’t have given them the opportunities.
No one took responsibility, and at times I thought I was watching Stick Cricket – boundary or out. Only 3 of us made double figures, Chalk top scoring with 44.
Another Springfield batsman decides to hit out or get out…with 20 overs remaining…
S.W.F were sounding pretty confident as they walked off, and I must admit I did think we had a tough task on our hands even before our bowling attack was handicapped.
But Sven started us off beautifully as ever, showing great control and getting some movement. Chalk took up the mantle at the other end, and between the 2 of them S.W.F were soon slipping behind the run rate, and three wickets down.
Ash took over from Mr Hartley, and started to throttle the batsmen, giving them nothing to hit and always thinking one step ahead. At the other end, bereft of options, I took it upon myself to do my best Mohammed Hafeez impersonation and send down some offbreaks.
Clancy extracted some sharp turn
I was actually delighted with how I bowled. Yeah, there were a few dreadful balls in there. But mostly I kept things tight, and turned the ball enough to cause their left hander genuine problems with the ball pitching on middle and turning past his outside edge.
The pressure built by the two of us led to some frantic running, some frantic stroke play and some frantic field setting as we tried to defend our sub par total. The innings was bought to and end by Caddy, who had already showed great hands in the deep, producing a good throw from long off to run out their number 11. S.W.F were 24 runs short.
A spirited bowling performance proved to be enough to overcome a sub standard batting effort and some dreadful injury luck. On measure, we probably got away with one. But there will be weeks where we play much better and lose, so it’s best not to dwell on it.
Man of the Match
Tough one, in such a team performance. Chalky and I both batted and bowled well, but ultimately we both got out too early. For me the stand out man today was Ash, 3 wickets at just over 2 an over. Great to have you back, and well played sir.
Dick of the Day
No stand out melts today. Chalky’s dropped catch wouldn’t normally qualify, but his 30 second juggling routine before it went to ground technically means he dropped 6 catches, landing him with his first DoD of the year. The first of many I bet.
Taking Off the Shine 