Getting Down to Business

An impressive bowling and fielding (sort of) performance laid the foundations for Bashers Business to pick up its first win in two years on Sunday, mincing the dirty doggies with two wickets to spare in what wound up a much closer game than it should have been.

Digging deep into the Bashers roster thanks to Fruitbox’s poor understanding of the Yorkshire language (take a crash course here and here) and Nuts looking to evade at least one night in the doghouse, Windy and Swoop filled in two vital spots on the team sheet.

The day started as expected, players told to arrive at 7am for a 7:15am bus and only Swiper, Bambi, Judy and Korean turning up in good time to get shit done. No pies, but almost two cases of Dr. Tims and a stash of chilled meats and we were good to go. Bambi was subject to the first of two instant karmas to be dished on the day while packing the esky. After scoffing at Korean for dropping and bursting a can and soaking the early birds, the club skipper followed suit less than 30 seconds later, punishing himself to 80 overs of stale beer stench in the piercing heat. The morning was topped off by a smashing effort from the Business captain, who turned up just 10 minutes after the amply-large bus was due to leave. Au revoir notre petit net session.

After a bus ride spent debating the legality of Tango’s new cricket bat, we rocked up at the ground and soon discovered we were the home team. Alas. Given their non-existent contribution to the day thus far, Fruitbox, Tango and Jolly were summoned to put out the boundary, no prizes for guessing that all three failed in their mission as they were busy chowing down on breakfast cheeseburgers in the clubhouse. Cheers Swoop and Skiddy for pulling the slack.

A lost toss later and Bashers found themselves exactly where they wanted to be: out in the field. As Warcry was running late, having opted to take a diversion via Wellington, the fresh cherry wound up in the hands of Swoop and Judy. Eager to make a mark in his second-to-last Bashers game for the time being, Swoop dropped two short ones in his first over to be dispatched through the covers by the anti-Basher. Ouch. A quick recovery in his barely deserved second over and he got the bugger caught at fly slip by Judy.

Despite joining the Bashers in a move described by Pudong’s captain as a loss of their best batsman, Judy (6-0-19-0) backed up his own claims that he actually “bowls a bit” and isn’t really a batter. An economical five-over spell went without a breakthrough, while Warcry (5-1-22-1) picked up a wicket from the other end. Alleged D3 first change bowler Paps then came into the mix, bowling out his eight overs consecutively, off a ‘proper’ run up, and picking up 2 maidens and a wicket for just 24 runs.

Skiddy (6-0-28-3), Fruity (5-0-27-1) prevented the doggies from barking too loud before the return of Swoop (8-0-45-2) finally finished them off, after a bunch of dropped catches cost a few extra runs and dragged out the innings. Honorable mention to Windy, who is proving himself as a specialist D1 cameo fielder and followed up his last outing’s soccer heroics with a catch and direct hit run out (and two dropped catches).

With just 170 to win, Fruitbox sent Swiper and Judy out to the crease for some inspirational teamwork. “Let’s have loud, clear calls,” Swiper tells the Basher freshman.

“Yeah, okay, you do that. I’ll just hit the ball.”

And hit the ball he did not, getting caught in short cover dabbing at a ball outside off having faced only seven.

That brought the supposedly ever-in-form Tango (78) to the crease, who had amassed a whopping almost nothing in his past two innings for the Bashers and Dragons. Swiper fell shortly after Judy to bring Fruitbox (32) to the crease, and the pill pushing beardy twins set to work on getting a Basher victory. Tango’s shoelace tally: 3. Their 87-run stance proved almost enough, but Fruitbox slipped one to the keeper to bring a short-lived Bambi to the crease. Paps and Korean followed with little success before Swoop and Skiddy saw us home with more than nine overs to go.

Fines began at SCSC after some negotiations with the bus driver, who wound up hanging around for two hours longer than planned. When we finally headed back to the bus, Judy smacked his head on the open luggage compartment – much to the amusement of Paps and Bambi, who for the second time this day regretted chuckling at others’ expense and cracked his own skull on the corner of the luggage rack door.

The fines session then made its way onto the bus, at which point chaos ensued. Those who committed Mensa fines had to perform a Tango slap, during which one slaps himself in the face, those who talked out of turn were actually made to drink… until mutiny and Hitler comparisons saw those looking to issue fines performing a Nazi salute to get the fines master’s attention.

Rock back up at Cages, Fruity gets in the bubbly because he’s nice like that then his beard twin starts smashing glasses like a buffoon.