Five at the farm

                                                                           Iggy writes:

It was another one of those "will it , won't it" rain days. The man from Midsomer Norton (groundsman) he say Yes, but only if it didn't rain again.

There was a last minute rush around to try and get hold of a tarp of some sort; to cover the wicket when the predicted showers came in, we couldn't get anything big enough, so that was the end of that.

Upon arrival at The Farm it was pretty obvious that there was going to be a shower or two. We spotted what looked like a tarp, locked away in the mower shed, there was a small gap at the top of the partition wall, and our Ollie was chosen, mostly because of his slender build and his agility, to take on the mission. He went up the wall like Spiderman and slid through that gap like a Giro though a letter box. Turns out it wasn't a tarp but a big Gazebo, nice one that will do the job.

Right, so The Plan; win the toss, bowl em out quickly, get the runs even more quickly and get to the pub to watch Brazil vs Chile.

RT1 and Kalu opened the attack on a drying but sticky strip, their opening batsmen were smart and got off to a flyer hitting anything short or wide straight to the boundary and ran very well between the stumps. Kalu got the big fella, caught by Tim at cover.

The 1st change brought the wickets Jules got the opener who was starting to look dangerous, caught behind by Ollie , who had charged the square leg umpire screaming obscenities en route, from behind his Hannibal Lector mask, in the previous over.
Wickets then fell regularly, the pressure of the tight bowling getting to them. Tim and Jules taking 8 wickets between them, all out for 92 in the 30th over. Great bowling great fielding and quick change arounds between over’s, they didn't get a look in.

Their skipper, who was in full rain dance mode, begrudgingly allowed us to go out and bat for 10 overs as the tea wasn't ready yet and it was sure to rain soon.
Evan had strict instructions to bat like a twat, and that he did, not wasting any time gaining a 100% strike rate for his 3, that brought Tooley to the crease, who also wasted no time, with Ahad playing sensibly at the other end, Dave hit a quick 42 in 18 balls to put the game in the bag before getting caught out by a low straight one.

The 10th over came and we had to come off for tea, still needing 20 odd runs. Then our gazebo came into use as the heavens opened, it did its job and kept the wicket dry enough to go back out on, when the rain stopped.

Ahad and Angelo went out to finish the job, with the pressure off, saw us home with ease in the 15 th over.

Not quite as planned but still caught the second half of the footy.

Tim T got MoM for the second week in a row for a fine bowling performance, His 5for costing him a jug back at the plough.

Ollie (Hannibal) Groom, won cider moment for his Umpire charge.

Ahad gets a special mention, for his 3rd not out in a row , Keep it going mate.

Scorecard