End of the over and a mid pitch discussion. “The never-ending task of self improvement.”
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson (25 May , 1803 – 27 April, 1882) American essayist, philosopher and poet.
After last weeks wash out against National CC at their Fawkner Park home, we were really looking forward to the return bout at our Como Park East oval. National are the competition pace setters having not lost a single game, but we were ready for an ambush. Why were we so confident? For a start, we had our most balanced team in for the year and secondly, we felt that we had been improving incrementally each week and were now a much better team than the one that started the season.
Strachany’s plan was that if we won the toss, we would bat so we could set a score without worrying about chasing targets and run rates etc. Just play our natural game. One thing we have been concerned with all year is that at some point in all our innings, we suffered a flat spot where the scoring rate has been painfully slow which always costs us in the final wash up – especially against the better teams. For this reason, Ricky Derons (a tail ender with a good eye) was promoted to open along side Nat “Mr Natural” Williams in order to get us off to a galloping start.
In theory it was a sound idea, as Rick is an aggressive batsman with a reasonable technique for tail ender who would happily throw the bat around without concern or fear of losing his wicket. So the potential pay off if it worked would be huge to our overall chances.
That was the theory.
The reality after Strachany won the toss and elected to bat was that Nat and Rick had to face up to some rather accurate bowling with side ways movement off the pitch which made scoring rather difficult. The two Indian lads who opened the bowling bowled a tight line with the only “loose” deliveries being very loose and being called wides. So the opportunity to free the arms up and swipe a few boundaries was not presenting itself to our openers.
Rick and Nat put on twenty five in about ten overs when Rick fell trying to play a big shot and was bowled by Nationals pace man Ganapatineedi. I entered the fray with many negative thoughts on my mind for some odd reason. As soon as I met up with Mr Natural he informed me that there was side ways movement and it was extremely difficult to get the ball away.
I took strike and cautiously played out the over and it was jagging about awkwardly as Nat had said it was. For the next four or five overs, I found it extremely difficult to get anything more than the edge or the toe of the bat onto anything and sometimes the ball just cannoned off my pads for leg byes. I struggled to middle anything at all.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, I got off the mark with a stylish leg glance off the front foot off Nationals medium pacer and skipper Jason Ivanecky for a single down to fine leg. After ten overs of this struggle, Nat succumbed while trying to play a push to leg and the ball skying straight up in the air off his leading edge. The Nationals keeper took a fine running catch at about where silly mid on would be standing.
Getting off the mark with a leg glance off the front foot. A picture of classical text book perfection (if I must say so myself!)
So after about ten overs Nat Williams and I had advanced the score by fourteen to thirty nine. My contribution off the bat was all of two. So as Richie Hounslow strode to the wicket, we had it all ahead of us. Richie was looking very determined and was intending to get stuck into the bowlers from the get go.
Richie straight away started playing some solid scoring strokes and I noticed straight away that in Richies approach there was a level of awareness displayed by a batsman that I was unfamiliar with. He was constantly asking the umpire “how many balls left in the over umpire?” and shooting the answer down the pitch to me “two balls left in the over VB…concentrate”.
Nationals brought on a leg spinner by the name of Stewart Irwin who gave the ball a lot of air and got some reasonable turn off the pitch, but his direction and length was all over the shop. He bowled a rank long hop outside leg stump that I pulled off the front foot and the ball raced away. As I turned for the second run, I saw that ball had gone some distance and was certainly four runs – but the umpire didn’t seem to know where the boundary was and apparently, neither did the National fielders and I had to be content with two even though I yelled out half way down the pitch – “come on, that’s four umpire!”.
In the next over from the leg spinner (the last before drinks), he yet again bowled a long hop outside my leg stump, and this time I clobbered the ball even harder than the first time and the ball raced away unequivocally for four runs. With one ball left before drinks, Richie Hounslow called out down the pitch “last ball VB, don’t get out now mate”. As it transpires, the leg spinner Irwin delivered yet another juicy long hop but slightly closer to my leg stump and it took all the restraint in the world to stop myself having a swish at it. It was literally asking to be thumped for a boundary, but my brain kept reminding me “don’t get out now…start again after drinks” and I gently patted the ball to short mid wicket and there was no run.
As we took drinks, I was well aware that I was fatigued and extremely thirsty as I had been batting for about thirteen overs by that stage and it was hot. I took off my helmet and called for my new S.Y.C.C. baggy blue cap. As we walked back to the centre, Richie reminded me that we had to up the ante and take on the field.
We continued where we left off by playing some strong strokes and running sharp singles. Because of my flagging state, I missed a couple opportunities for sharp singles which I was conscious could be costly in the final wash up of the game. So I kept reminding myself, “turn over the strike to Richie and he will do the rest”.
As Richie and I started to get on top of the bowling, I suddenly noticed that the National fielders had gone really quiet and you could hear a pin drop. I thought to myself “these bastards aren’t used to being dominated – they are used to having it all their own way”. In the mean time, Richie Hounslow played a marvelous pull shot for six over square leg and other delightful strokes. I was simply turning over the strike to Richie where possible and was just as much a spectator as our lads on the sidelines to the display of class batsmanship that Richie was putting on.
I started trying to get in on the act as well, by first playing a couple of lofted drives that cleared the infield but not the boundary riders and I ran a single each time. I tried to play a cut to a shortish ball from Irwin the leg spinner, but the ball didn’t so much keep low, as run along the ground. “If he bowls one of those on the same line as the stumps and it keeps low again and I try and cut or pull it, I will be in deep trouble. I will be a candidate for bowled or LBW at this rate” I thought to myself.
Richie reminded me in between overs of my responsibility to the team to stick around with him “don’t get out now, because if you do, it will slow down the scoring rate” Richie warned. I nodded my head fully comprehending, but at the same time determined to play my part in pushing the scoring rate further along and keeping our foot on Nationals throat.
There was enough time for me to have a real scare of being run out. I played an on drive straight to mid on. I thought there was an easy single in it as I set off for the run, but half way down the pitch I realized that I had hit it too well and the ball was already in the hands of the fielder and he was about to wind up and throw at the stumps. I stepped up my pace a bit, but as the throw passed wide of the stumps I breathed a sigh of relief as if the throw was accurate, I would have been short of my ground by about a meter and a half.
Pull shot off the front foot for four runs.
By now it was the start of the thirty second over and I had been batting for nearly twenty two overs. I simply had to smash a few boundaries I felt. My eye was in, my partner was killing them, we had the measure of the bowling…the time was NOW. The leg spinner Irwin bowled a juicy full toss outside off stump – normally something to guide past gully for a single, but I tried to hoick it to square leg which was vacant – so if I connected, it would fly away for four runs. Instead I took a massive swipe and missed. I was angry at myself at having missed this golden scoring chance. The next ball was yet again a short long hop, but this time in line with my stumps. I got onto the back foot and shaped to play a pull shot through square leg when the ball did not spin, it simply did not bounce at all. It skidded through ankle height and rattled my stumps as I swished over the top of the ball.
A drive over the infield. I only got a single for this shot.
As I looked back I noticed that the keepers gloves were pushing through the stumps and that the bails had fallen forwards, not backwards. I looked to the square leg umpire wondering if perhaps he had in his exuberance knocked the bails off with his gloves before the ball bowled me. The umpire signaled to me that the ball had bowled me – which I was already aware of, but he didn’t seem to understand the nature of my query. ie: “did the keepers gloves knock down the bails first?”
It mattered not – I walked off the ground to a standing ovation from team mates with the customary “well batteds” sprinkled amongst the applause. I didn’t raise my bat in acknowledgement as I believe that a batsman needs to at least pass fifty before raising his bat. At the very least hit the winning runs in a tight contest or do something else remarkable in the quest for victory. Maybe I am old school in that regard.
I had made a painstaking twenty one which had spanned twenty one overs. My partnership with Richie Hounslow had yielded fifty one runs in just a tick over ten overs with my share of that being nineteen. We had silenced the previously chirpy Nationals fieldsmen with some attacking stroke play and some sharp running in between wickets. But the partnership could have been so much bigger – but for some horrible bounce, I could have batted on longer. That is turf cricket.
Nashi Alam passed me on the way out as he walked out to bat. Before I had even taken my pads off, Nashi was also dismissed by a ball that did not bounce by Irwin. I was starting to feel bad as I remembered Richies words “don’t get out now, because if you do, it will slow down the scoring rate”. How prophetic was he? Strachany strode out to take up the attack to the bowlers and almost immediately came to notice with an exquisite cover drive for four. It wasn’t to last, soon after Strachany was also bowled by Irwin with yet another one that did not bounce much.
By this stage I was kicking myself for getting out – my dismissal had triggered a mini collapse and had indeed slowed down our scoring momentum as Richie Hounslow predicted it would. Craig Nott entered the fray to join Richie and our hopes now rested on the sixth wicket partnership. The journeyman Notty has played for clubs as diverse as Richmond, Tyabb and the Southerners – so he is a well travelled cricketer. When talking about his game, Notty always talks himself down. So beyond a padlock defense and some deft dabs, we had no idea what he could really do. He once described himself to me earlier in the season as a “nurdler”. After watching Notty and Richie set about dismantling the Nationals bowling attack, I realized nothing could be further from the truth.
Craig Nott smashing a boundary over mid wicket in typically belligerant fashion.
Richard Hounslow and Craig Nott put on seventy three for the sixth wicket in double quick time with some of the most audacious stroke play that I could have imagined. Craig Nott ripped into the Nationals bowlers with a zeal that I was sure he did not have. He smashed deliveries over the infield for boundaries and was in the end dismissed rather unluckily to a delivery that should have been called a no ball as he swatted a chest high full toss from a medium pacer down the throat of a nationals fielder who took the catch only one meter in from the fence.
As the catch was taken from the sidelines we were all jumping and waving yelling to the umpires “no ball…it was a NO BALL!!” Craig Nott had crossed to the other end and quietly asked the umpire why that chest high delivery was not called a no ball?” Nothing controversial or heated about it – but the National captain shot out “I am going to cite you for that!” Seriously, get a grip man.
Richie Hounslow pushing one to mid wicket in his majestic innings of 65 not out.
Craig Nott made an inspired twenty seven and the innings wound down soon after with Richie Hounslow finishing undefeated on sixty five out of a total of 6/185. A good total, but perhaps ten to fifteen runs short of what it should have been. A number of times in our innings the umpires and the National fielders were seemingly confused about what was and wasn’t a boundary, with the result that a number of certain four runs were not called and were thus reduced to twos or ones. We train on the ground and we knew by the distance of where the balls had finished up that they were indeed fours, but the umpires and nationals fielders were less clear about it. I do not for one second think that either party were being dishonest, but it certainly cost us at least ten to fifteen runs. It cost me two further boundaries.
The new ball was taken by Rick Derons and Alex Harris – two more different people you could ever see. Rick is in his thirties and is a quality fast bowler who gets movement off the pitch and Alex is still in high school and has no need for shaving razors. Alex bowls left arm fast medium and has a big future ahead of him.
In the first over of the innings, Rick got us off to a flying start bowling the National opener Marchant for a duck. Not long later, Alex “Bomber” Harris got in on the act and removed Singh for six by yorking the Nationals opener. Two for eight and all of a sudden we dared to dream of pulling off an upset. Very soon afterward, Bomber Harris had Nationals batsman Irwin as plumb LBW as you could ever imagine. The ball would have missed off stump and leg stump, but would have ripped out middle stump about half way up. It ended up being a huge let off for Nationals as Irwin started swinging his bat and collecting boundaries along with his partner Veeramreddy as they blazed away with a partnership of sixty one in double quick time to swing the momentum back in Nationals favour.
It was Rick Derons who got the much needed break through when he trapped Irwin LBW for thirty two and the Nationals score resting on sixty nine. Soon afterwards Richie Hounslow – a veritable one man team – trapped Veeramreddy LBW for twenty five and the score on seventy eight. Just before drinks, Richie Hounslow did it again by capturing the wicket of Ganapatineedi for fourteen and the Nationals score on ninety eight.
At drinks in comparison to our score which was two for forty two before we smashed a further one hundred and forty three in our last twenty two overs, the Nationals were ninety eight…but crucially, for the loss of five wickets. So while they were scoring quickly, they had been losing wickets too. Curiously, none of the Nationals players shared drinks with us as is the customary practice. It looked to me that they were feeling the pressure and they were keeping to themselves. Earlier all but three of their players had snubbed our mid game tea and cakes which was also curious. That is their prerogative, but it is not particularly sporting and I for one, will not be forgetting their stand offish behaviour in a hurry. At the end of the day – a team is a reflection of their captain. I don’t know what my team mates thought about this, but it certainly struck me as disrespectful to snub our hospitality.
I felt that we were one wicket away from exposing their tail. National had been winning their games all season rather easily and their tail enders had not really been exposed to a pressure run chase. So one more wicket would see them capitulate – at least that is what my perception of the state of play was.
Soon after the resumption of play National batsman Apender Gupta looked to be clearly LBW to the bowling of Richie Hounslow but the umpire was unmoved and gave it not out much to our collective disbelief. With this stroke of good luck, Gupta and Sumant Yerra proceeded to throw the bat at will and in the process had numerous lucky escapes with aerial strokes dropping either between or just over fielders. It was uncanny luck, but throughout the day, we had not dropped any catches until the charmed Gupta smashed a delivery as high as it went long. The ball seemed to sit in the air for an eternity and I actually had time to look who was under the ball. I saw Strachany and I thought to myself “good, he is one of a handful of guys in our team who is confident under a high ball and is great catch”. No sooner had I had this thought that Strachany dropped what was ultimately a very difficult catch with the ball striking him near the shoulder.
At that point, the game seemed all but over as Gupta and Yerra had ridden their luck and had brought National within sight of victory. The score was now 5/171 with only fifteen required for victory. We were dead in the water as there were still five overs left to bowl. Craig “Black” Nott who had bowled beautifully without luck then got the big wicket of Gupta…initially we appealed for LBW and the umpire raised his finger only for the ball to roll onto Gupta’s leg stump to bowl him anyway.
Six wickets down and fifteen runs still required…there was still hope that we could pull off an upset. Strachany then threw the ball almost in desperation to Alex “Bomber” Harris who had bowled well in his first spell to take a wicket, but had also been manhandled by the National batsmen as well, so it was a gutsy call by Strachany – but the correct one I thought to myself at the time. Two runs were added to the total when Bomber Harris produced a hum dinger of a Yorker to shatter the stumps of the obdurate Yerra who had made a courageous thirty five.
Through all this, our First Eleven who had won their game in heart stopping circumstances on the next oval wandered over to stand on the boundary and cheer us on. It was really heartening stuff to be supported in such a way and I will never forget the cheers and shouts of encouragement and the invincible feeling it gave me.
The score was now 7 for 173 and fourteen runs were still required for victory by Nationals. We could sense panic coursing through the National camp as what had seemed like a regulation victory a few moments ago, was now becoming a far more difficult prospect. With our collective belief up, Bomber did it again…he bowled another surgical precision yorker that uprooted Burford’s off stump.
Alex "Bomber" Harris, a wonderful opening bowler and high school student with a big future.
Euphoria! 8 for 173 and the Nationals camp was a flurry of activity with pads and protective equipment being adorned, much swearing and general disbelief at what was happening before their eyes. Strachany then replaced the exhausted Nott and bowled the next pressure packed over which the National batsmen scored five priceless runs. It was very tightly bowled over until just one loose ball was delivered and the batsman pounced by smashing it for four runs. Damn.
It was now the forty fourth and penultimate over and Alex Harris was entrusted with the ball for his last over of his second spell. Almost immediately, Bomber Harris produced yet another peach to clean bowl Raj for five and the score was now 9 for 180! Ten balls left and six runs required for victory. It was at this point that I felt like calling out to Strachany to bring everyone in to make running a single suicidal and to also throw down the gauntlet to the National tailenders to attempt a dangerous hit over the top which would probably produce a catch.
I would have only left a deep mid wicket and a deep mid on for the attempted cross batted swipe over the top. Everyone else would be brought close enough in to shut down any quick single and I also would have placed one bloke at short cover and another at short mid wicket. On top of that, without a fine leg in place, I would have instructed the keeper to stand back an extra two meters to ensure that there would be no mishap.
Instead, the field was deep attempting to cut off boundaries, but allowing the possibility to run fairly easy singles as long as they got bat onto ball. With all this tension coupled with our club mates cheering support from the sideline, I didn’t go over to Strachany as I normally would. Bomber Harris then bowled two deliveries in a row that strayed down the leg side and they were both called wides. The second one was finally called a wide after much deliberation by the umpire. Now I didn’t have any objection to these deliveries being called wide per se, but what I did find objectionable was how similar deliveries served up to me which flew untouchable down the leg side were not also called wide. The umpire was clearly feeling the pressure and went trigger happy so to speak.
The target was now four runs to win and there was still eight balls left in the innings. It was a huge moment in the game and I kept thinking, “hit the ball to me in the air and I am going to catch you. Hit it along the ground to me and I am going to run you out”. I was psyching myself up to do something big…now was the moment.
The next delivery by Bomber Harris was a thigh high full toss and the National number eleven batsman, Jason Ivanecky swung hard across the line and “thwack”! The moment it hit the middle of the bat, I had no doubt where that ball was headed. I watched the balls inevitable trajectory high, high, high over head as I had a great view from backward square leg in watching the balls trajectory clear Richie Hounslow who was stationed on the mid wicket boundary. The ball went at least ten meters over his head and nearly ended up in Williams Road.
Six runs. The wild whoops of joy from the National batsmen and team mates on the sidelines told us everything we needed to know. We had yet again managed to lose a game we were in a position to win. The very next ball National were dismissed. So, we had dismissed the top team in forty four overs and had only lost six wickets ourselves, yet we were the losing team…but not losers. We had fought it out to the end and Alex Bomber Harris had been heroic with his three quick wickets at the death to leave him with the figures of 4 for 51 and the deserved man of the match award just over the unlucky Richie Hounslow who made a glorious sixty five not out and took a miserly 2 for 16 off his nine overs.
I was nearly in tears at the end of the game at having gotten so close to pulling off a miraculous victory, but to be denied by a once in a career shot for six by the National number eleven batsman. That is cricket sometimes. We were so close to knocking off the top of the ladder team who were (and still are) unbeaten.
Next time…always next time.
Vic Nicholas
Melbourne
AUSTRALIA
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