Bus arrived to find Leisure as comfortable victors but Pleasure on the receiving end of a hiding. Not chance at another Basher’s Day today but an opportunity to get one foot in the semi’s and keep the pressure on the Devils at the top of the table.

Filthy lost a key toss to the Anti-Basher, who inserted the Business weary off the heavy skies ahead and knowing the rain rules are skewed heavily in favour of the chasing team.

Third new opening combo in four games walked out and Filthy quickly walked back in. Cassius and A’Trois in his Business debut putting on 52 for the 2nd wicket. However Cassius and Dazzler quickly followed the wicket of Artois and the Business were 92-4 after 18 overs. Stats and Tubby put on 57 for the 5th wicket, Tubby and ‘TBC’ 37 for the 6th and the Chitty and Tubby 55 for the 7th before Tubby was tragically caught at mid-wicket for 99 off 77 balls in the second to last over of the innings. Business finished up on their highest score of the season so far, a respectable 248-7.

The Anti-Basher quickly switched into cunt-mode and the umpire was persuaded to delay the game. Out come the Doggies umbrellas and the usual whinging and yapping associated with aforementioned mutts. Finally they decided they’d reduced the target enough and wanted to play. 175 needed off 27. Bullshit compared to 249 off 40 but defendable.

Business got off to a good start with Paps picking up two early wickets in a great 6 over burst, conceding only 20 runs. V. Rathore was quickly yanked off “hurt” after his 5 off 13 and the Anti-Basher slithered to the wicket. Not for long, as Chitty picked up his first Business wicket. I would tell you the FOW but the Dogs couldn’t score ina fucking brothel so our scorebook is a disgrace. B. Goodwin and J.Keel then chased down the remaining runs at close to 8 an over winning in the last over with a ball remaining.

• Sunday 13 May 2012 SRFC Near
  Bashers Business 248/7 ()
  DPR Hot Dogs 176/4 (4)

Still in the top two but in danger of losing touch with Devils in first. Two games aganist them in the following two matches look key.

2012 Division One

The business are back after an extended break.

With the Pleasure and Leisure continuing their winning ways this last weekend it’s time for the Business to get back in the saddle. No match against Pudong is easy but with some great performances from our guys in the SCC game and some great action in Div 2 there will be hot competition for places.

Please post availability below if you want to take the Bashers to 8 wins for the season.

CC Latex

Filthy won the toss and inserted the opposition  were quickly in trouble. Dazzler was nipping it both ways and Paps was hooping the new ball round corners under the cloudy skies. Tiny clung onto an early Sajid waft at 3rd man giving Dazzler his first wicket at 7/1. Paps quickly followed that up with a viciously swinging delivery that caught the inside edge of Saleem’s bat and thundered into the stumps making it 20/2. 10 runs later Waqar took a suicidal single to Filthy, whose underarm lob from a few feet away found Waqar well short of his ground (30/3 after 6 overs). A maiden from Dazzler followed and in his next over he claimed his second wicket with a sharp caught and bowled to dismiss Mujahid with the score at 39/4 after 9 overs. This brought Meer and Shafqat to the wicket with their team in trouble. Shafqat had caused us and many others trouble in the preceeding seasons and his wicket is key to dismissing K2 cheaply. Tiny was brought into the attack following Paps’ sharp 5 over salvo and promptly had a Tiny meltdown as is his habit. 6 wides and 2 no balls later Tiny had finished with 16 off his over and it was drinks. K2 humming along at almost 7/over but 4 down.
That quickly became 5 as Tiny rewarded his captains faith in him by claiming Shafqat LBW in the first over after drinks. 93/5 after 14 overs. In came Najeeb to join his captain and the two put on another 15 runs before Tiny yorker shattered Meer’s stumps after another unseemly hoick. 108/6. Mehmood, in his first game back with K2 after a season with the Dogs, came in at number 8 and disappeared pretty quickly. Cassius claiming a sharp catch behind of the red hot Tiny. At 119/7 the Business really felt the business. That was all to change with Zahid coming in at 9. Along with Najeeb, Zahid put on 74 runs in quick time as Filthy and Growler both grassed catchable opportunities. Sinbad was introduced and deposited several times into the bushes sourrounding the ground including enormous 6s of consecutive deliveries. His 2 overs costing 39 runs. Stats finally held a catch for the Business to dismiss Najeeb of Tubby for 71 off 47 balls. 193/8. From here Zahid (40*) really put the foot down and dominated the remaining partnerships off 38 with Ziafit (7) and 15 with Shoaib (4). Filthy returned to mop up the tail and K2 were dismissed in the 35th over for 246.

Having tied with the Devils in the previous game chasing 242 the Business were confident they could do it (except Stats who later admitted to thinking we’d already lost by the halfway stage). Sir Dick and Oscar opened after their relative success in the first game. They more than matcched in on this occasion with Sir Dick thrashing his way to 41 off only 32 balls, including 6 4s as his first six scoring shots. He fell to a well judged catch at 73/1 off 10 overs. With the platform set Oscar and Growler set about accumulating singles, Oscar in particular accruing a large number of wides bowled to him (a direct result of his batsmenship if one was to ask him). At 91 Oscar fell LBW for the 2nd game running for 18 (off 38 balls). Stats joined Oscar and they put togther 25 off 7 overs before Growler was harshly judged caught behind (off his thigh pad) for 13 off 32 balls. 116/3 off 20 overs meant the Business were slightly behind the run rate at the halfway stage but with the big guns still to bat. Dazzler joined Stats and the two put on a quick 34 in only 4 overs before the introduction of Shafqat to the bowling crease saw Stats slash a wide delivery to Saleem at point. 150/4 off 24 overs. 97 needed of 16. Tubby joined Dazzler fresh of his bludgeoning 70 in the first game and was quickly into his stride the a boundary through cover point of his first delivery. Runs seemed very easy to come by as Tubby and Dazzler scored at almost 10 an over during a dazzling 78 run partnership. It was ended only when Shafqat held another sharp chance of a lofted Tubby drive to leave the Business 228/5 off 32 overs. Only required off 8. It took Dazzler and Cassius only 3 overs to polish of the runs and give the Business and the Bashers club an unbeaten start to the season. 249/5 off only 34 overs.

• Sunday 8 April 2012 Dulwich College
  K2 CCC 246/10 (0)
  Bashers Business 249/5 (4)

Dazzler: 8-1-42-2, 59* off 44 (8 4s/2 6s) 1 catch = MOM
Tubby: 5-0-25-1, 37 off 23 (5 4s/1 6s)
Tiny: 8-0-56-3, 1 catch
Sir Dick: 41 off 32 (6 4s/1 6s)
Fithy: 4.2-0-31-2, 1 run out
Stats: 23 off 31, 1 catch

2012 Division One

Could this be another Bashers day!

Pleasure - 9:00am vs  Digital Devils @ SRFC Far

Leisure - 9:00am vs Dulwich Knights  @ SRFC Near

Business - 12:15pm  vs DPR Hot Dogs @ SRFC Near

Please post availability so we can see how we are set to have the 3 teams out on the same day.

I have a good feeling about this weekend!

Bashers Day?

Cheers

CC Latex

The Daredevils are chasing an elusive consecutive title and were keen to stamp their mark on the 2012 season early.

The Business team arrived at sparrow’s fart to SRFC for no particular reason and the first taunts of a mutiny seemed on the cards. Filthy looking to divert attention put Sir Dick in charge of a nice relaxing yoga class in the sun to try and get everyone more focused. Filthy took the reigns of leadership back just in time to lose the toss but managed to get what he wanted anyway.

The reigning Sante Fe champions won the toss and backed themselves by opting to bat first. The Devils had obviously not paid attention to the Bashers fielding warm-up which by all accounts was one of the sharpest on record.

With Cranky temporarily unavailable due to the HK 7’s Filthy looked for the next oldest guy to help Dazzler open the innings. As the bowlers blew out a few cobwebs in the opening over’s so did the batsmen and we found ourselves on the backfoot 50-0. Dazzler was the first to break through when he clean bowled their opening batsman and shortly afterwards Paps got his bunny. The Devils then unveiled one of their new signings. It was hard to tell initially if they were short or if this was actually one of the SRFC guys that usually drives the tractor being asked to make-up numbers. Either way it was pretty weird to have a Chinese guy playing in Div 1. What was even weirder was he was actually really good and starting to smash us around the park. It took a solid catch from Dazzler to finally dismiss him for 41. At the other end Nike Newtown was doing his usually hit and miss and catching practice on the way to 89. Without mentioning any names a party loving, taste tester who looks a bit like a fictional adventurer did give him a huge reprieve at the beginning of his innings. But hey, Dave dropped him twice as well.

In general we were a bit quiet in the field and were mostly fetching the ball from behind the ropes for much of the day. In spite of that Dazzler was particularly tidy only conceding 22 off his 8 over’s and was by far the most economically bowler of the day. Needless to say we found ourselves staring down the barrel of 242 for victory.

Filthy asked Oscar and Sir Dick to get things underway. And they were steady in seeing some off the shine of new ball before both leaving on 9 a piece -  Dick played a shot befitting of his name and Oscar found out the hard way that we were playing the LBW rule that day. Growler and Stats looked good and chipped away at the total until Growler was caught for a solid 24. Dazzler hung out with stats for a bit but was cut down before he got into his zone. That brought in Tubby with the Bashers chase in tatters at 90 for 4 in the 24th over; meaning we needed about 150 off the next 14 overs. What followed was a brutal onslaught from Tubby as he belted 70 runs off 39 balls, smashing their “spinners” out of the attack with some blunt force plundering. The Devils became dejected as there seemed to be no way though as Mike started to break SRFC chairs and their will to live. Tubby was eventually bowled and departed but now the Bashers were in a good place. Cassius came to the crease and wasted no time in keeping the momentum going.

Ollie hit an uncharacteristic near run-a-ball 46 before he was caught behind. Bringing in Filthy with Bashers needing about 35 off 31 deliveries with 4 wickets in hand. The pair enjoyed a couple of productive overs. With the Bashers needing 12 off 14, Cassius skyied one to mid wicket. Then Filthy got a few runs before edging to the deep third man, bringing Sinbad and Paps to the crease with 6 runs being required of the last 6 balls. Sinbad hit 2, then played and missed, then hit a shot to long off. They made two safely and he was run out at the non strikers end attempting the 3rd. So two needed off 3 balls. Sameer faced the first and got bat on ball for a single to tie the scores. Leaving Leppar to face the last two deliveries and needing bat on ball. So the game ended in a tie after some sensational big hitting from both teams.

It was a shame to be in such a great position to win and then let it slip again. But not a bad result first up to get 240 on the board with the bat. A bit more life in the field and every catch taken and we should be all over them next time. Bring on 2012!

• Sunday 25 March 2012 SRFC Near
  Daredevils CC 241/7 (2)
  Bashers Business 241/10 (2)

Bowling:
Dazzler 22 for 1 off 8

Catches:
Dazzler 2

Batting:
Tubby 70 off 39
Stats 46 off 49

Man of the Match:
Tubby