Tour
7th July 2006
Ploughmans v Cirencester fails to live up to it’s billing…
Anyone that played in the corresponding fixture last year will remember it to be a classic. Certainly the best game of cricket I’ve ever played whilst wearing sky and navy… So the question was, could this year’s game match it? Answer: categorically, no.
Whatever the reason, though I’m pretty sure it was the amount of beer imbibed the previous night, I have to say it’s a shame that we were unable to compete with Ciren. They’re a great bunch of lads with a great place to play and we really didn’t do the fixture justice this year.
Apologies if the details are a bit hazy, but I wasn’t supposed to be writing this report – Will Barras was. Anyway, I won the toss and elected to field… I opened with Sir H and myself with Reynolds and Rowe opening the batting for Ciren. Reynolds is an excellent player, and having got out fairly cheaply the year before seemed determined to punish us this year. The fact that he made 134 in the end goes some way to proving this theory. Harry gave everything but couldn’t force a breakthrough and it wasn’t until both opening bowlers had been and gone and 3rd and 4th changes Barras and Follows were well into their spells that we got a wicket; Spence clean bowling Rowe. Exit one good batsman, enter another… This time, the skipper’s brother who showed great technique and a good understanding of the wicket – taking singles at ease and then smashing the bad ball. It was only an excellent bit of fielding by Ben Brown at Deep Mid-Off that ended his innings. Hudson slapped Swap’s part time leg break hard and straight and Ben dived forward and held the catch in those bucket size hands of his. Skipper Rich Hudson came to the crease and played sensibly; giving as much strike to the now flying Reynolds. Eventually, with the score somewhere near 250 (this was an overs game remember!!) Reynolds played a tired shot and was bowled by Lonnen. Bray came and went fairly quickly, again bowled by Lonnen and then apparently Rich Buckley and I instigated a run out to remove Calvert - shows how hazy my memory is though as I can’t remember that at all! Innings closed on 291-5 off 40 overs.
After an excellent tea (did you enjoy that Laney?), Ploughmans set about their response and, frankly, the less said about it the better. The top 6 managed 29 runs between them – the combination of chasing the ball all over the place, the hangovers and some good bowling and fielding put us on the back foot straight away. But, we aren’t Ploughmen if we don’t fight, and given that I skipper this merry lot I thought I might as well try and lead by example (plus of course my Mum and Cally’s parents were watching on the boundary!). Assisted in no small part by Will Barras (did I mention he should be writing this report?) we set about frustrating Ciren as much as possible. We knew we couldn’t win from the pretty much impossible situation we found ourselves in so we opted to treat it like a ‘serious net’; blocking the good balls, nudging and bunting singles where we could and then smacking anything remotely loose. We put on 80 odd and in the process a bit of respectability to the scoreline. I went first and then, as so often happens a few overs later Will went for a very well made 44 – shame he didn’t quite get his maiden half century as there was some real grit and some excellent shot selection in there. His front foot driving is an example to us all. Hang on a sec, why am I “bigging” him up? He should be writing this report! After that, we collapsed again with only Spencer fighting back (despite the LBW appeals from the boundary) to make a quick 12 before he was last man out with the score on 132 a.o.
Needless to say, the result was forgotten pretty quickly as everyone got straight back on it in the bar and back at The Bull, but, please, let’s try a little harder to make a decent fist of this game next year please. Our supporters on tour and the opposition deserve it.
TL