Hammered again by Harold's men
Highgate Wood, 5/31/2014
Gaieties won by 7 wickets
Strongroom: 123 [Harper 4-4, H.Thurston 4-12]
Gaieties: 125-3 [Ingrams 59*]
View the Scorecard
A bitterly disappointing game this for Strongroom, as again we underperformed against a moderately strong Gaieties XI. We have never beaten Gaieties, and so much as we tried to recruit a strong team, it was difficult to plug the gaps left by the likes of Jimmy, D.Gower, Mitch and Joe, who were all collectively unavailable.
Heavy rain in the week generated a familiarly soft pitch, and it was little surprise when Hugo won the toss and inserted Strongroom into bat. Jon Gower and John Rajeev opened the batting, and whilst I left as much from Schneider and Cowley outside off-stump as I could, John opted to swish at these deliveries, and looked quite precarious as he missed the majority of these outswingers. Surprisingly, we managed to swish and leave our way to 38-0 off 10 overs, including one amusing and incongruous straight 6 by John Rajeev.
Then, in double-quick time, we were both dismissed, and a staggering collapse ensued, effectively ending the contest with Strongroom teetering at 55-8. The majority of our batsmen played weak and indeterminate shots to unspectacular bowling. I can only think it was Hugo taking pity on our situation which led him to bowl slower and seemingly more friendly bowlers, which our final wicket-pair of Riaz (33) and Asif (17) took advantage of, raising our total to a slightly less humiliating 123 all out. Both batsmen survived strong appeals for catches behind, amidst some acrimony and dismay for Gaieties.
Another excellent provided courtesy of David Proctor, including some trademark baps, cheese and branston pickle - a do-it-yerself Ploughmans if you will.
So, we set out to bowl out Gaieties for less than 123. But, we failed. We didn’t bowl so badly, but we didn’t bowl brilliantly either. Riaz bowled a tidy 8 overs, albeit a little too flat at times. Grant bowled a mixed spell, but did remove both openers, one with a well-disguised slower ball, and the other (Vincent) to a very smart, low catch behind the stumps. Grant also had a very strong LBW shout against Dutta first ball, and whilst Shomit never really got going and fell to a rank long-hop from John Rajeev, it was Ingrams (59*) who really took the game away from us.
Both teams retired to the Woodman on Archway Road, and whilst Gaieties enjoyed their beer, for us it was a case of reflecting upon a hugely disappointing performance.
Written By: J.Gower
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