Venturers Vs Broughton Gifford, Wednesday June 25th

Broughton Gifford 102/4 (20), Venturers 103/8 (19.2)

Play-Cricket Results

On arrival at Odd Down we found the band playing, the flags out and everything prepared, but no opponents. It dawned on us that when we had switched the fixture to this ground to avoid the artifical pitch at Sulis, we had forgotten to tell them. Gregory drove back to Sulis to fetch them, and we conceded the toss by way of compensation. We also agree to bowl ten overs from one end and then ten from the other, so as to save a bit of time. It did, at the cost of some confusion.

Broughton Gifford elected to bat, but made slow progress against Imran. We were very confused by the left-hand/right-hand combination, which together with not switching round at the end of the over meant that nobody was really sure where they were supposed to be. The left-hander eventually lost patience and launched a ball from Imran to a great height, but not very far. Unfortunately, the fielder underneath it was Gregory, who forgot how to catch during lockdown. He backpedalled, but not enough, and the ball landed behind him. Basir was taken off, despite bowling well, because he would be needed later: Gregory and Zuber made little impression, the former being expensive at first. Eventually Imran tried Ajeet and he immediately had the right-handed opener well caught by Steve, keeping wicket. After that only the left-handed opener was much of a threat, and Basir ran him out in his follow-through when he tried to steal the strike. One other briefly threatening batsman was swindled by Bruce (an even better catch by Steve). Gregory, Ajeet and Krish shut the game down and we were left to make 103.

However, by now the bounce was unpredictable and sometimes extravagant: “tennis ball”, said the Broughton Gifford wicketkeeper after she had taken the last ball of the first over at head height. Only Jaideep, who accumulated 33, and Zuber, who made a brisk 17, batted with much confidence. Krish got beaten by the weird bounce: the ball flicked his back pad on its way to the keeper but Gregory thought he had detected shoulder of bat before that. (Jaideep, the non-striker, thought so too.) Krish later denied it. We know from DRS that batters do not always know whether they have hit the ball; but we also know that umpires don’t either, and it is possible that this one was wrong. However, he had made a few, and so did almost everybody else; moreover, there were a lot of extras. Not byes: the wicketkeeper is very good and despite the strange bounce she conceded only one. But strange bounce and misdirection would take the ball out of her reach, and they conceded nineteen in wides, from probably about ten actual wide deliveries. On the other hand, wickets fell steadily. Stephen hung around until he got run out and Imran’s aggressive approach worked once but he got bowled when he tried it again. Basir played back to a full ball. Ajeet seemed solid, but now his partner was Bruce, with Gregory to come. A couple of wides helped: then, when one did come within reach, Bruce whacked it firmly over mid-on and ran two. Ajeet wanted a third: Bruce sent him back in time and secured another single next ball, levelling the scores. Ajeet blocked one and found the single after that.