That rooftop pool looks inviting
Thurstan College, Colombo, Sri Lanka, 3/6/2016
Brumby's won by 8 wickets
Strongroom: 121
Brumby's International PVT (B Team): 122-2 [B.Marikar 56*]
View the Scorecard
And so, after a very spicy lunch, to the last game of our tour. Another defeat (7 in 7). Still, we all seemed to thoroughly enjoy it. We came up against some very good teams and players, some of them too good for us. We came away thinking that we were good enough to have won at least one, maybe even two matches, but that we just couldn’t quite put together a complete performance on any single day.
Anyway, let’s get back to Match 7, against our old foe of Nafeez, Bashith et al. We won the toss and batted first. Ujjal again looked lively (though struggling a little against the extra pace of their opening bowlers) and Mitch a class above any other SCC batsman. But then came the familiar procession of dismissals as our batters repeatedly got in, showed they could survive and score (though without reaching the boundary enough) and then got out. It was a batting display that looked tired, short of confidence and belief, and again struggling to score against good spin bowling. To be honest, it’s a struggle to recall anything of note to report. Maybe Dave P’s run out when in reality he could barely walk.
Spirits were down and the finish line was in sight. We didn’t go out to defend 121 in the right spirit, some of us probably not rating our chances much. A bit of grumpiness setting in. Again, we displayed an inability to bowl one side of the wicket, or to maintain standards in the field (at least two dropped catches, I think, plus some dozy misfields). We were rather bemused to see Bashith coming out to open the batting when such a modest target was set - he was too good for the match situation and the game was all too quickly up. Dave G picked up a wicket with a nice inswinger - better than most of his exploits with the bat. Ujjal picked up a trophy of a leg injury to take home with him. We apologised and shook hands and bid farewell to the opposition. And raced back to our rooftop pool to say goodbye to Ujjal before he whisked himself back off to Hong Kong.
Sri Lanka is a great place for a cricket tour. Special thanks to Asif (and family), Nafeez, and all of the opposition, umpires and (some of the) scorers.
Written By: D.Gower
|