Bashers Cricket Club

Shit Shoes30 November 2014

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After Tank’s critique of the last round’s lumberjack, I hope this is more acceptable.

Three Bashers, with heavy heads from the previous night’s End of Season Bash, arrived at the Camel at 11.45am. Peking rode up on his bike, and everyone immediately jumped into a passing taxi, leaving Peking’s keys hanging in the bike lock (later Tantric was able to take the keys out and hand them to the Camel bar staff – cheers Tantric). This shows the mental preparedness of the team – totally focused on the afternoon’s games.

It should be noted that the Bashers Slayers paid tribute to Phil Hughes with a row of bats and caps (even if we only had 5 bats and 3 caps) and all sides observed a minute of silence at the start of the games.

We will miss you Phil Hughes!

Hot Dogs 61 (14-22-25) vs Bashers Slayers 119 (39-50-30)

The Hot Dogs were short 2 players with 1 player late (until Alex Cumming walked past and got invited to play), so the Bashers Slayers sportingly offered to let them bat first until that late player arrived. It didn’t help them too much as Messi and Peking claimed wickets in the opening overs. Peking in particular bowled the Hot Dog’s female batter with a deceptively loopy gem! The next batting pair from the Hot Dogs featured a solid effort from the aforementioned Alex, but Korean pulled off a stunning stumping off Long Dong to gain the momentum at the end of the partnership. Messi claimed a hat-trick on the first three deliveries of his second over to pull the Hot Dogs back, and Long Dong followed up with a solid over that included a good run-out at the back. The Hot Dogs fought back though – taking 15, including a big 7 off a Peking over, to scrape together a reasonable target of 61 runs.

Shit Shoes and Peking got the side off to a flying start, scoring easily, with only Shit Shoes, in gentlemanly fashion, getting caught off the slow Hot Dog’s female bowler. Peking soaked up a string of wides, and Shit Shoes finished with a crisply struck 7 off the final ball of the partnership. That bought Messi and Korean to the crease for the third match in a row, and now they seemed to have almost worked out their running, except when Messi called Korean through for a single off an edge to the keeper. They recovered to post an impressive 50 runs, and Messi looked more like a batsmen the longer he played, even smashing a 7 to the back net. The final partnership began with the Bashers Slayers already 28 runs ahead of the Hot Dogs total, and so Paps and Long Dong batted conservatively. Long Dong in particular showed impressive high elbow technique with a series of elegant premeditated forward defense shots. The Bashers Slayers finished on 119 to win comfortably by 58 runs.

Pudong 73 (47-18-8) vs Bashers Slayers 90 (28-39-23)

There was a fair amount of chirp coming from the Pudong side, particularly from the brightly neon clad Amogh. So it was sweet that on his first ball he charged Shit Shoes only to completely miss the ball and get stumped by a tidy Korean. That was the high point as Graeme McKim launched into the bowling with a string of dismissive 7s (often dropped onto the back net by the Bashers back-row men). There was a complete breakdown at the back, with at least a half dozen stolen runs as the Bashers spent time chased the ball. However, Pudong couldn’t keep up the momentum as the game swung back to the Bashers in the second partnership. Peking took two wickets in two balls, and Messi and Long Dong also bowled well to restrict the scoring to 1s and 2s. Korean started the final partnership with another Bashers hat-trick against the shortest Pudong player, and Peking repeated the effort of his first over to finish with 4/4 off his 2 overs. Shit Shoes picked up another stumping off the final delivery to end the Pudong innings on 73.

The Pudong side had a few good bowlers, and so the Bashers repeated the same batting order. Amogh opened up for Pudong, but Shit Shoes smacked a 5 and a 4, and he went for 16 off his over (and got plenty of return chirp from the Bashers bench). After that the batsmen played safe, scoring enough 1s and 2s to meet the required run rate and taking few risks. Messi, now full of confidence, began the second partnership with a 4 and a 5, and then the shortest Pudong bowler had a wides melt-down. That took the Bashers to within 6 runs of the Pudong total. Long Dong did his best to scare the bench with his efforts to run himself and Paps out, but rarely succeeded and the Bashers Slayers cruised to their second win of the afternoon.

Messi was the outstanding Basher this week, and is developing into a valuable part of the indoor squad. After the games, most of the team made their way back to the Camel to eat a late lunch/early dinner. Korean and Shit Shoes stayed on to watch the Blackcaps complete a remarkable away test victory over Pakistan by an innings and 80 runs! All in all a great day’s cricket!