Pleasure V Dulwich, 28 September 2016

Pleasure were narrowly beaten by a strong Dulwich side on Sunday, despite Skiddy’s highest ever score for the Bashers (64), a total lower than his female rejections in August.

Bashers posted 182 on a fast outfield, with several Dulwich dropped catches helping the score along. The two openers Pussy and Korean saw off the opening bowlers with 15 and 14 apiece before exiting with style. Bambi helpfully holed out for 0, allowing Pope to post a useful 29, with Shit shoes scoring 23. Bambi insisted that he “batted well in nets on Saturday”. Well done Bambi.

The batting innings was characterised by quite a few boundaries, and not so much running. Skiddy’s running technique is something of an optical illusion, a bit like Baywatch slow running except with very small but very fast moving legs. Skiddy put his high score down to a fierce regime of “very niche pornography the night before. I watched some really nasty and very specialist stuff, and it imbued me with the strength of a thousand tigers”.

Omega got out for a well-deserved 1 runs. “As the only Australian on the Pleasure side, I felt it my duty to get out and allow batsman from nations with a prouder cricketing history to lead the way.”

Verruca was about to pad up to come in without shoes (he is anti-shoes. Not anti-Shit Shoes, who we cherish like a ginger stepchild missing a chromosome, but the shoes you wear on your feet) when Meihua got out for the last ball of the innings, which was very unsporting of Dulwich. “I hate Dulwich” said Meihua. “They have rubbish haircuts and their shirts are garishly inappropriate for the civilised sport of cricket. Perhaps because they teach at the second-rate off-shoot of a public school populated by the nasty progeny of Britain’s nouveau riche in a horrid corner of south east London, they think sartorial standards don’t matter anymore. Well they do, I tell you.”

Rash won the throw downs, with two fantastic boundaries. He also won the fielding practice with some classic catching, ball stopping, and clear and loud calling for the ball. Well done Rash.

Korean led the way out with gloves on, which he managed to hide from the umpire for the whole innings by standing behind the stumps. Well done Korean. “Lovely gloves they are, made from cotton, or something. Oh and plastic. Or is it leather? I’m not sure. Can I get back to you?”

Pussy and Bambi opened the bowling, and with the wind up their behinds/in their faces kept the run rate relatively low in the opening salvos, while Pussy picked up the wicket of one of their openers with the most audacious catch from Omega, who like Rainman, flashed his meaty hand at a ball flying at very high speed, plucking it from the air like Mr Miyagi plucking flies.

Rash came on at first change, but the ball went swinging like a bored 1970s housewife, and he conceded one or two wides. Meihua followed up with a couple of handy overs and lovely grunts. Skiddy attempted to take off the wildly swinging Rash, who promised to get a bit “wickety” and picked up the other batsman from his only outswinger of the day the next over, well caught by Korean and his sneaky gloves.

Skiddy duly put himself in to bowl with remarkable results. Conceding only 21 runs from his 17 overs, and taking a well-deserved wicket, he put Pleasure within touching distance of winning. Mal backed him up with some overs as tight a mouse’s ear. Verruca showed how to field without shoes, eventually working out that you should throw the ball to Korean, or the bowlers end, not Meihua.

A couple of dropped catches later, and some wayward bowling put all ideas of winning out the window, as Dulwich won with a couple of overs to go. This was despite Tantric’s creation of a new wicket-taking ball: the bamboozler. “I’m a bit like Shane Warne, but better. I can out-think any batsman, and also other people when not on the cricket pitch, like Silver Bullet, or Einstein”.

Pleasure retired to the bus, and from there to the Camel. Which is where the bus goes after cricket. Fines were duly given, with Pope delivering the best fine of the season for anyone living up to their Bashers name: Meihua grunted, Verruca declined shoes, Rash itched his rash, Korean carried on being a bit Korean, Bambi frolicked with gay abandon, Tantric made love for 3 hours at long-on, Skiddy creamed his underpants, Pussy licked his own balls and then went to sleep, and Shit Shoes wore jandles. Which is Kiwi for thong. Which is Australian for rubber clogs.

Well done Skidders for being our best batsman, bowler, captain, and Baywatch extra.