MACCABI AJAX – VICTORY AT LAST!

The victorious Yarras Fifth Eleven. Everyone of us was exhausted when this photo was taken, but it was the sweetest victory!

“Victory is sweetest when you've known defeat.”
~Malcolm S Forbes - (August 19, 1919 – February 24, 1990) publisher of Forbes magazine.


After coming close a number of times, the mighty Yarras Fifth Eleven enjoyed a win on the weekend! Now in the after glow of a tremendous win I can bask in the glory of my teammates heroic efforts….but that would be getting way ahead of the story.

Sunday dawned cloudless and hot. Good news for our not out overnight batsmen in Penny Lane and Connair De Souza, but bad news for our bowlers who were not going to enjoy the same seam friendly conditions as Maccabi had the week before. Our score was a precarious 7/124 and after having a quick look at the rock hard pitch that resembled a road, I also sensed that we had nowhere near enough to defend.

In the opening over of the day, Conrad was softened up with a series of quick balls that were dug in short and then he fell for the sucker punch by misreading the slower ball and spooning a catch to gully for a soft dismissal without adding to his overnight score of ten. Conrad was ropeable at himself for not going on in great batting conditions.

Penny Lane setting off for the run to bring up his fifty.

It was now 8 for 124 and things were not looking too good. Enter Cameron McKenzie-Smith – a barrel chested fast bowler who looks like he indulges in wood chopping in his spare time and he wields his bat more like an axe rather than a blade. Without bothering with the triviality of getting his eye in, “Twin Cam” set about swinging his bat like a lethal weapon and crashed the Maccabi bowlers to the boundary repeatedly. All the while Penny Lane was pushing the ball around as he edged closer to his fifty.

Julian Lane acknowledging the boys cheers.

Penny Lane thumped a boundary that took him to forty nine and then soon after he guided one square and brought up his fifty. A gutsy innings that was exactly what was required under the circumstances. But it was too good to last. On fifty one, Penny was rapped on the pads, but the umpire gave it not out. The very next ball, Penny was again rapped on the pads and this time he was not so lucky as the umpires finger went up.

Penny Lanes fine knock ends as he exits the playing arena with a gutsy 51.

It was a great blow because Twin Cam was going like the clappers smashing boundary after boundary and the score was starting to mount up. As so often happens, Twin Cam fell soon after for an entertaining twenty one and we were all out for 155. I thought considering the conditions we batted in last week, it was not too bad. Penny however didn’t like our chances after experiencing the pitch first hand – “we are f**ked...the pitch is a road, it is not doing anything” was Penny’s first words upon exiting the arena.

Cameron McKenzie-Smith on the rampage during his cameo of 21.

With the day getting hotter and hotter, no hint of greenness in the pitch and an absolutely cloudless sky – I was starting to worry myself. We really couldn’t take a trick as far as conditions went and as we walked out onto the ground to take up our fielding positions, I also noticed that the outfield – in contrast to last week – was lightning fast. So not only were Maccabi going to get a benign pitch compared to the sticky dog we got, but they were also going to get a wickedly fast outfield which would aid them to score quickly. Things were really stacked against us.

Bobby Fisher bowled the first over which passed by uneventfully without any hint of movement or assistance to our bowlers. Twin Cam took the new ball with Bobby and in his first over he uprooted the off stump of the Maccabi batsman Rothschild. Just the start we needed! We geed ourselves up by reminding each other that we needed to keep taking wickets. I knew that on this pitch and with the large amount of overs left, we basically had to bowl Maccabi out in order to win the game.

The plucky little Maccabi wicket keeper Plavin (the venus fly-trap) joined Ben Jones and the two young Maccabi batsmen dug in to take the score to 1 for 24 when Bobby Fisher removed both Plavin and then Jones in a double strike to have us rocking with delight. At 3 for 29 Maccabi were not off to the start that they wanted or needed. The veteran Schneider dug in with the young tyro Fetter for a critical and frustrating partnership. Fetter playing in an orthodox manner looks every inch a future star batsman. On teh other end of the scale, Schneider seems to hold the bat backwards when he is facing up, but somehow spins it around to play with a straight bat and he frustrated our bowlers with his stonewalling. Their partnership was ended when Jason “Torvill” Endean produced a beautifully disguised slower ball to trap Schneider plumb in front with the score now 4 for 57. The next over Connair bowled pesky young Fetter with no addition to the score and it was now 5 for 57. We were half way there – surely they would capitulate now?

Maccabi dug deep yet again in the shape of father and son combination of Ian Jones and Josh Jones. The fast outfield was killing us as each time they found a gap, be it with a well placed shot or a fluky edge - it seemed to fly away for a boundary. The heat was now starting to kick in and I could see from the faces of our players that they were on the brink of total exhaustion. Maccabi were careering towards victory and there seemed little we could do to stop their victory charge as Ian and Josh Jones were batting with relative ease.

"If we can break this partnership up, then we will clean up the tail surely?" I thought to myself. But how were we going to break this partnership – they looked rock solid? Then something happened that swung the game back in our favour. I started to notice that the younger Jones was starting to struggle with the heat. He would bow down after most balls and gasp for air and his foot work became almost non existent. I thought to myself "this lad is out on his feet - it is only his duty to his dad that is keeping him going". Eventually, he could stand no more and he retired hurt and was escorted off the ground with jelly legs where he promptly collapsed under a tree with water being poured over him to try and revive him.

It was a bad break for Maccabi, but for us, it was the chance we needed. Yossi Herbst came in and departed soon after without scoring making it 6 for 98. Eli Herbst also departed for a duck and then in amongst all this carnage the Maccabi captain Ian Jones who had been holding us up was also bowled out after making a brave twenty. It was now 8 for 104. Eli Paneth came and went for a duck and it was now 9 for 104 and Maccabi were dead in the water…or were they?

Josh Jones through this whole collapse was laying flat on his back under a tree barely moving. He did not look any chance at all of coming back in to bat and we debated this amongst ourselves as each Maccabi wicket fell – “will the kid come back out again?”. With the ninth wicket he picked himself up and came back out with a runner. Jones still looked rather unsteady and we all must have thought that this was all rather token and he was not going to survive for long, but survive he did! In fact, he seemed to bat even better than earlier by flashing his bat at anything wide of his stumps and he hit a few boundaries and all of a sudden visions of the freaky ninth wicket partnership that steered Burnley home to an unlikely win in Round One certainly crossed my mind and probably a few of my team mates too.

Our bowlers had toiled magnificently in the heat and here we were one wicket away from victory and all of a sudden these guys were making a charge. I chased away the negative thoughts by thinking to myself, this Maccabi number eleven batsman is not going to survive long enough for Maccabi to pull off an improbable win – surely one good ball will get him. And that is exactly how it played out. Twin Cam was rewarded for some tight bowling by the Maccabi number eleven spooning a catch right back at him which he held. It was his third wicket and his second catch for the day. Bobby Fisher had picked up 5 for 24 in a wonderful display of line and length bowling and Torvill and Connair picked up a wicket each.

In stifling heat we only used four bowlers with each one of them bowling themselves to a stand still and in Connairs case – the point of sickness - as he had to go off after his spell briefly to get a drink as he had completely hit the wall. The bowling group were heroes in my eyes...pure guts and determination.

We were cock a hoop at having secured our first win for the year. There were heroes a plenty as you can imagine. Penny Lane for his gutsy innings, Bobby Fisher for his five wicket haul, Twin Cam McKenzie-Smith with his cameo of twenty one with the bat, three wickets with the ball and two catches in the field and many others.

On the clubhouse balcony as the boys all enjoyed a well deserved cold beer, Strachany praised the efforts of all the boys in particular his choice of this weeks man of the match Bobby Fisher. He again reserved the encouragement award for me for my efforts in throwing myself around the field like a mad man. If I felt that Strachany was being generous the week before last with his effusive praise for my fielding, then I felt he had gone to even greater lengths this time as I personally could remember at least two guys who were more inspirational in the field – Jason Endean who had patrolled the covers like a miserly cheetah and Twin Cam who had produced a couple good stops and taken two catches – one of which was a very good slips catch while he was stationed at second slip.

In any case, I was delighted to be held up as an example for fielding commitment by my captain and my teammates yet again. I still have a long way to go, but the recognition from my peers makes the hard work seem worth while. It was a tough game...we had the worst of the conditions both weeks - a seamers paradise first week while we were batting and a dead track the following week with hot conditions when we had to defend a small total.

It was a win of pure guts and determination and I am so proud of all the boys and the parts they all played. The bowlers in particular were simply heroic.

I salute them all.

Next week is a new week and yet another two day game...what further adventures does this game have in stall? We all have to wait and find out!

See you all next week!

Vic Nicholas
Melbourne

MACCABI AJAX - GREEN PITCH & CLOUDY SKIES

Playing and missing a ball going down the leg side early in my innings.

“A car hit a Jewish man. The paramedic says, "Are you comfortable?" The man says, "I make a good living."”
~Anon

This weeks game against Maccabi Ajax was always going to be somewhat out of the ordinary in a number of ways for a myriad of different reasons.

Firstly, while we were playing at home yet again, we were not playing at our usual Como Park West ground which is adjacent to the pavilion, but Como East, which while abutting Como West, is a much longer walk around to the pavilion. This necessitated setting up chairs etc on the mound on the other side of the oval. A completely unfamiliar experience unto itself, but more drama was to follow - which I will get to later.

Secondly we were playing Maccabi Ajax - a cricket club where the overwhelming majority of the players are of Jewish origin and practice the Judaic faith. This is fascinating to me as one of my great interests is Eastern European history being of Eastern European origins myself.

Maccabi Ajax started way back in 1929 as the Hakoah Cricket Club. In 1945, the club renamed itself the Ajax Cricket Club and played its home games next to the cemetary in Princess Park.1 This was logical from a demographic perspective as Carlton had a large vibrant Jewish community from the turn of the century until the mid 1960's whereby thereafter the community drifted south of the Yarra to more prosperous suburbs.2

Ajax Carnival team 1947.

Ajax competed in the Northern Suburbs Cricket Association. In the late 1950's, the club moved to Fawkner Park (following the trend of the bulk of the Carlton/Brunswick Jewish communities move south). It was in 1962 that Ajax made the move to their present home ground at Albert Park to start competing in turf competitions.3

In 1973 a sister club was formed in Doncaster with the name of Northern Maccabi Cricket Club to cater for the nascent Jewish communities growing in the Doncaster/Balwyn areas. By the mid to late1980’s the club fielded up to four senior teams and an Under 16’s team in the Eastern Suburbs cricket competition. By the mid 1990’s however, Northern Maccabi was facing the same decision as their sister club Ajax had faced thirty years earlier in that their Jewish demographic base had started to drift over to the Southern suburbs. It was in 1996 that the decision was made to merge with Ajax and form one club – Maccabi Ajax.4

So with a unique history whereby Maccabi Ajax draw their players from a particular community, they certainly stand out from the crowd. Having said that with the massive influx of immigrants from the sub continent, new Indian and Sri Lankan ethnic dominated teams are being formed and fielded in competitions across Melbourne – so the Maccabi Ajax experience is now being replicated.

Being the culturally sensitive soul that I am, I was aware in the days leading up to the game of the dietary issues faced by most of the Maccabi Ajax lads when afternoon tea was to be served. I searched around for some kosher goodies to ensure that the lads did not starve to death on account of our forgetfulness. I picked up a Glicks Challah and some cookies and that did the trick. The rest of our lads brought lots of sandwiches, but with all of them containing ham – there was never going to be any takers. My Glicks Challah however, completely disappeared as the hungry young lads from Maccabi dug in.

When I arrived at our ground earlier, there were concerned looks on the faces of our boys and on the umpires. While the covers had protected the pitch of our usual home ground at Como West, the Como East oval pitch was green and wet due to some leak in the covers. A delayed start to the game was the best we could hope for and the possibility of the game being washed out was very real as the pitch at one end was very wet and the run up dangerous.

I was happy enough to play no matter what the conditions. I just want to play all the time! How bad could a seaming green deck be? The umpires and captains agreed to monitor the pitch and the surrounds every half hour but the situation was not overly hopeful as there was dark cloud cover with no wind and sun to dry the pitch out. Eventually, around 2pm play was scheduled to get under way, but only from one end! I had never before played in a game where all the bowling would take place from end and all the batting from the other with the batsmen changing over after every over, but it was either that, or no play at all. So, we decided some cricket – even in such curtailed circumstances – was better than no cricket at all.

I was praying that we would win the toss so we could give our bowlers some favourable conditions to bowl on for a change, but as fate would have it, with a green deck looming, Strachany lost the toss and the Maccabi captain had no hesitation in putting us in to bat. “Just wonderful” I thought to myself as I padded up.

Our fifth different opening combination in as many games took strike. The veteran Brian “Happy” Hannon took strike with Sam “Fairfax” Mitchell-Head as his partner. Happy has batted for over one hundred overs combined in his three matches so far this year. We were going to need yet another stoic performance from him today to keep our innings together and “Fairfax” plays with a straight bat, so we were hopeful he could stick around as well.

As Happy faced up to the opening over, I could immediately see that this pitch was not going to do us any favours at all. The bounce from short of a length was nothing short of astonishing compared to the low decks we usually play on. By the second over of the day, disaster had already struck as the usually rock-like Happy had spooned a catch straight to square leg as he flicked one off his toes. Oh dear! I was walking out to bat half way through the second over with only four runs on the board. As I passed Happy he muttered, “don’t worry, the ball is coming through straight”. I have learnt long ago never to trust the judgment of the outgoing batsman as they are usually so angry to be out, they will never offer any really helpful advice with “the bowlers are shit” being the stock standard line.

The young bowler who had dismissed Happy went by the name of Ben Jones and he is a left armer bowling over the wicket, so I opened up my stance to be facing him almost front on to make sure I could see where he was going to be pitching the ball rather than standing too side on. It is a technique I learned more than thirty years ago watching Geoff Boycott bat when facing left armers like Geoff Dymock and it has instinctively stayed with me ever since when facing left arm bowlers.

The first delivery I let go as it fizzed past my off stump at a good height. I then blocked out the next two before pushing a ball to mid wicket for an easy single to get off the mark. That was the over and we changed ends as I now had to face up to Yossie Herbst a fast bowler with a Hassidic beard and a Yarmulke. The guy looked innocuous enough, but he then ran in and speared a delivery at my chest which I defended down the wicket with much “oohhhs” and “ahhhs” from the Maccabi fieldsmen. His next delivery was a bouncer that was heading for my face when I swiveled and hooked it down past square leg. It looked four all the way as I middled it well, but alas, the outfield was dead slow and I had to make do with two runs.

Two photos as part of a sequence of yours truly playing a hook shot for two off Herbst.

This battle went on for a number of overs as Herbst repeatedly dropped the ball short at me trying to intimidate me. Little did he know that fast bowling is not my weakness, let alone short pitched fast bowling. Some of Herbsts bouncers seemed to slow up and sit up after pitching thus seeing me get through my attempted hook shot too early a few times.

On one occasion I bottom edged an attempted hook down onto my pad. On another occasion, one of his bouncers fizzed just over my head as I ducked just in time. This test of courage went on a bit more when Herbst dropped short again, this time it was pitched on or just outside off stump and I shaped up to play a shoulder high cut so the ball would fly over the slips cordon, but the ball altered course dramatically after pitching and started to cut in sharply from outside off to now passing by my left shoulder. It was already too late to change my stroke to a hook shot, so I was left with two options; either jump out of the way and let him think I was a coward, or let the ball hit me.

I chose the latter and the ball cannoned into my back just at the very bottom of my left shoulder blade with a dull thud. The ball ricocheted away to square leg and I walked back past my stumps thinking “why the hell did I just do that?” as the searing pain started to kick in. As I showed no emotion – though everybody would have known it would have hurt like hell – I felt I had won the battle for now. I gave it a slight rub, but I quickly took guard for the next ball.

While the bumpers largely stopped, the ball was still seaming wickedly off the deck and all the bowlers bowled a sound line to exploit the conditions. I seriously could have been out at least half a dozen times in the opening half an hour. One pull shot that I again got through too quickly because of the ball holding up off the pitch, struck the back of my bat and ballooned high up in the air. My heart sank as I assumed it would go to hand, but somehow it managed to just drop behind the slips cordon and I survived.

Another time I was even luckier, a vicious out swinger by Herbst took the edge of my bat and flew waist height to first slip who was standing about sixteen or seventeen yards back. The slip fieldsman caught me, dropped me, juggled it back up, caught me again, dropped me, juggled the ball back up and then finally put me down. That was a truly lucky escape and I must say that Yossi Herbst deserved a wicket, but as often happens he missed out.

My batting partner through this ordeal – Sam “Fairfax” Mitchell-Head - was also having a tough time of it. He played and missed outside off stump, but was able to get bat onto ball with a straight bat everytime something was pitched on the stumps. Fairfax nearly contributed to his own downfall when he mistimed a pull shot to a full toss and spooned a simple catch to square leg – only for the fieldsman to fluff it. We met mid pitch at the end of the over and I told him he was lulling them into a false sense of security. The poor bugger smiled back at this dry gallows humour as we both knew that beyond hanging in there, not much else could be done.

Young Aaron Fetter was brought on in place of the hostile Herbst. Now sizing up this fourteen year old lad I was about to face, I thought to myself “surely this kid will bowl some loose stuff that I can whack away to get the scoring moving along?” How wrong could I be? His first over was as perfect as you could ask for. Every ball was pitched in the corridor of uncertainty and he allowed the pitch and the seam to do the rest. The Maccabi brains trust had noticed that I was batting a long way out of my crease to the fast men to nullify LBW’s and exaggerated seam movement, so their pint sized teenage wicket keeper – hence forth known as the “Venus Flytrap” for his ability to take the ball cleanly – stood right up to the stumps to force me back into my crease.

By the second over from Fetter, things only got worse. I managed to play out a maiden with the ball spitting off the pitch and hitting me on the ribs, another rapping me on the pads to stifled appeals and then a ripper of a ball that I shaped to get forward to, only for it to hit a divot or something and jump up towards my face. As I raised my bat instinctively, the ball hit the shoulder of the bat and ballooned to much excitement to where a silly mid off might be standing. However, much to my good fortune, nobody was placed that close and Fetter was forced to make a run for it from his follow through in an effort to complete the catch and the ball dropped only a couple of feet in front of him as he belatedly arrived.

The rest of the over continued in a similar vein and I was staggered that I had survived at all. The pitch was covered in divots made by the ball and my bat was starting to get covered in mud marks as the ball was gripping on the pitch and carrying the mud with it on it’s ascent off the pitch. In past games I never concerned myself with gardening the pitch or patting down uneven bits, but today was very different. I was feverishly trying to pat down as many divots as possible as each time the ball hit one of those freshly made divots, it would have the effect of a miniature slips cradle – some deliveries would skid through low, others would freakishly lift up off just short of a length and others would viciously seam at right angles in the most unpredictable manner.

Survival on this pitch was reduced to a game of chance. There was no skill session that could prepare me for playing on a sticky green wicket and in no way could I trust the pitch to play full blooded drives. The uncertainty was too great. So I figured that dropping the sheet anchor and just hanging around for at least another hour in the hope that the pitch might improve as the day wore on would be the only sensible thing I could do. I passed on this sentiment to Fairfax at the end of the over and he nodded his head in agreement while at the same time congratulating me on surviving the over from hell dished up by Fetter.

This is the moment where the ball has flown off the shoulder of my bat to silly mid off during "the over from hell". Note how green the pitch is in this shot.

The double bowling change brought on a young fair haired bespectacled lad by the name of Josh Jones. While capable of bowling some fine deliveries, he was not as accurate as Fetter and thus offered a little bit of respite, but not much. As happens when there is a bowling change, the batsmen often break their concentration as they mentally congratulate themselves for seeing off the better bowlers – and so it was to prove. Fairfax received a very hittable delivery which he mistimed straight to a fieldsman. After his hard work in surviving some pretty hostile and unpredictable bowling, it was a wasteful way for Sam to go. His hour long vigil at the crease yielded only four runs as if to highlight the difficulties in scoring on such a pitch.

Enter Jason “Torvill” Endean.

The man.
The myth.
The legend.

Torvill is an allrounder of immense skill who played in our Fifths all last year and his sterling performances with both bat and ball had this year earned him the Vice Captaincy of the Fourths who play on Saturdays. He had offered to help us out in this match to overcome our player shortage brought on by the Spring Racing carnival. Torvill is no “fill in” though. He was fresh from making an inspired ninety two the day before for the Fourths and boasted a season batting average of a mammoth 229.00! Clearly, the man was in the form of his life. However, this pitch was that bad, that even the mighty Jason Endean was battling for survival. He was positive and upbeat between overs – as you would expect from a guy with a 229.00 season average – but clearly the pitch was playing tricks that dissuaded even natural stroke makers like Torvill from displaying the full range of their skills.

Playing a shot to mid wicket.

I drew strength from Torvill’s confidence and started to play some more attacking strokes. I smacked a lovely cover drive that should have been four once it beat the infield, but that slow outfield kicked in again and I had to be content with a well run two. I then smashed an off drive in the air that easily cleared the mid off fieldsman, but yet again held up in the outfield, so we could run only another two. Drinks were going to be taken soon, so my plan was to make it to drinks, regroup with Torvill and then put on a sizeable partnership. My only concern was that despite having batted for about eighteen overs, I was still not “in” in cricketing terms. Normally, it takes me about four overs to get my “eye in”. For the uninitiated in cricket speak, that means that your judgment of what the ball is doing and your reactions to the pitch conditions, light and ball movement is set and you start feeling comfortable and are able to play your natural game. Today, there was no way known that I could say that even after batting for more than an hour that I had a handle on the conditions and had my “eye in”. I simply could not trust the pitch to play to any script. It seemed to have a mind of its own and rendered batsmanship to a game of stout defense and hope.

Playing a watchful defensive stroke.

With drinks now in sight and playing on my mind, Josh Jones served up a low rank full toss that was so wide that if I left it alone, it probably would have been called such. The thing is, on a pitch like this, balls that don’t pitch on the minefield are a gift almost too good to resist as scoring opportunities are so rare. As the ball floated down, I was torn in three minds…should I smash it, should I just push at it in the hope of getting a couple of runs if I beat the infield or should I take the more circumspect option and leave it alone altogether as drinks was almost here and there was not too much point in taking any unnecessary risks?

A wristy shot to square leg.

In retrospect, I should have left this horrible wide full toss altogether. Or if I was going to go for it, then smash the absolute daylights out of it. Instead, I dabbed at it and the ball hit the toe of my bat, yet still somehow flew all the way to mid off where the only person tall enough on the whole field to take the catch leapt in the air and caught it after a slight juggle. With a lesser bat, it would have just petered out in front of me, but this was one occasion where my super connecting bat did me no favours as the ball flew with laser precision to the fieldsman. If any of the other short lads from Maccabi was under it, it surely would have cleared their heads, but no, I had to pick out the tallest bloke on the field.

Stupid, stupid, STUPID!

A cut off the front foot.

I had suffered through some excellent bowling for more than an hour on a really spiteful pitch only to surrender my wicket to the worst ball I faced all day. It was a harsh lesson in concentration. I had concentrated so hard to that point to resist my natural instinct in going for big shots, yet I had thrown all my hard work away in an instant of madness.

Yet again this season, I had found a new way to bring myself undone. My innings finished on seventeen which consisted of seven singles and five twos. Of those five twos, on any normal day, at least four of them would have been fours as the outfield was dead and the ball was slowing up a lot when played along the ground.

I trudged off disconsolately knowing that I had badly let my teammates down by wasting my innings like that. Julian “Penny” Lane passed me on his way in and I told him to give them stick as I usually do. The score was now a precarious 3 for 36 and there was still much hard work to be done to climb out of this hole. The situation deteriorated even further when Jason Endean was out for seven soon after and we were teetering at 4 for 41 as Strachany entered the fray just before drinks.

“Penny” and Strachany then dug in to put on a gutsy partnership worth thirty three with Strachany scoring twenty of them with some aggressive stroke play as Penny played the straight man. Strachany was out in the same manner as the rest of us by spooning a catch when he was up and running and the score was now 5 for 74. Nashad “False” Alam then came and went quickly for one and in an awful decision, Rakish "The Rake" Kothapalli was controversially given out caught behind for three when he clearly hit the ground with his bat and not the ball.


We had now slumped to a rather precarious 7 for 79 with Conrad De Souza – surely the best number nine going around – coming in to join Julian “Penny” Lane who had had survived the collapse and even survived a dropped catch to still be there to give us some hope. The pitch was now starting to play a little better as it started to dry out and the conditions were improving. Penny and Connair saw us through to stumps with a sensible partnership worth forty five. It was not without its moments it must be said – in the final over of the day with fieldsmen crowding the bat – Conrad was dropped twice. Once at first slip and then later when he hit one firmly at silly mid on who put down the sharper chance.

We had averted disaster as the boys walked off the ground fading light with Connair on ten not out and Penny on forty three not out with our total score sitting on a far more respectable 7 for 124. Next week the boys have the opportunity to bat on and put on some more runs to put some pressure on the Maccabi batsmen. Penny particularly deserves to go on and get his half century as he batted sensibly and held our innings together when disaster was lurking around every corner. With the very capable Connair partnering him, a big partnership is not out of the question.

I am very hopeful that we can secure our first win of the season – but much hard work still needs to be done before we can even dream of that.

More next week!
Vic Nicholas
Melbourne



B Hannan c ? b B Jones 2
S Mitchell-Head c ? b J Jones 4
VJ Nicholas c ? b J Jones 17
J Endean c ? b J Jones 7
J Lane not out 43
*D Strachan c ? b E Herbst 20
N Alam c ? b E Herbst 1
R Kothapalli c ? b E Lipshatz 3
CA De Souza not out 10
CW McKenzie-Smith dnb
R Fisher dnb
Extras (0nb,7w,11b,2lb) 20

Total 7/124

Overs 55

____________________________________________________

1 Ray Montag “Ajax Cricket Club” - http://www.maccabiajaxcc.com/clubinfo/clubhistory.htm
2 Cf Carlton A History, Edited by Peter Yule. Melbourne University Press 2004.
3 Ray Montag “Ajax Cricket Club” - http://www.maccabiajaxcc.com/clubinfo/clubhistory.htm
4 Richard Lustig “Northern Maccabi Cricket Club” - http://www.maccabiajaxcc.com/clubinfo/clubhistory.htm

PARKVILLE II – THE SEQUEL

Parkville seamer Steven Healy sending one down to me as the wicket keeper and slips watch on. Brian "Happy" Hannon is backing up at the non strikers end.

If at first you don't succeed, try, try, try again.
~Proverb - attributed to T. H. Palmer 1840


Most people would argue that sequels are rarely as good as the original, and most of the time they would be correct – but today’s game could make an argument to the contrary plausible.

Due to a quirk in scheduling, we were slated to play last weekends opponent Parkville yet again. Not only that, we were playing them at our home ground – again.

Last week we meekly capitulated for seventy six and then watched Parkville pass our total with eight wickets in hand en-route to a respectable total off their forty five overs. Winning the toss and sending us in on a green top certainly aided their cause, however, our uncustomary ineptitude with the bat let us down badly.

Upon learning that we would be playing Parkville again, I could not help thinking all week about what we would do differently this time. I knew one thing for sure, I was going to be keeping an eye out for any over pitched Yorkers to avoid a repeat of last weeks freak dismissal.

Our selected team contained no less than five changes with Bobby Fisher, Sam Mitchell-Head, Conrad De Souza and Timmy Miller returning and Chris “CC” Connelly playing his first game of the year for the Fifths.

While we had lost some bowling fire power, we had gained some batting strength and regained the services of a specialist keeper in Timmy “Corky” Miller in place of the reluctantly deputizing Strachany.

Another subtle change that was going to effect me was Nat “Mr Natural” Williams intimating to me that he had a preference to opening rather than waiting around to come in at number three. I passed this info onto Strachany who admitted he was already thinking of making the change in any case. So Nat went up one in the order and I went down one. I really didn’t mind as I actually have a slight preference for number three, though to be truthful, I have come to realize that there is very little difference.

So my thinking all week was along the lines of, “if we can bat to our potential, we will be in with a big show”. I have no doubt that the other lads in the team were thinking along the same lines. While we were pole axed last week by very accurate bowling on a seam friendly pitch, Parkville themselves on an improving wicket only posted 145, though they lost only three wickets and batted in no great discomfort (other than when Harry Potter was whistling them around their ears).

This weekends match also had the special significance of being Amit Mehta’s last for the club before returning to India to work in the family business. Amit is a quiet, solid citizen and is well liked by all. I took a liking to the man from the first time I met him, so like everyone else, I was sad to see him go. Amit is always one of the first with a quiet positive word at training and after every game. I resolved that it would be a fitting send off if we could win this game for him, but fairy tales don’t always have ideal endings – so I was hopeful more than brimming with confidence.

There were so many feelings of déjà vu as I arrived at the ground and saw our lads warming up and the Parkville players also going through their pre-game routines. “Different result this week guys, different result” I thought to myself.

Strachany lost the toss yet again and we were sent in to bat…yet again! While I padded up I had a few quiet words with Amit and I am sure he was feeling emotional at the response from the lads. Today was day of payback for last weeks humiliation. At least that is what I was thinking.

Happy and Nat kicked off proceedings as I sat padded up waiting my turn. I had a morale boosting visit of a friend of mine who had specifically come along to see me play and I was keen to do well to make his long drive worth it.

The going was somewhat slow and when Nat was out bowled to Parkville seamer Healy for an uncharacteristically subdued ten in the sixteenth over, our score was only twenty six.

I charged onto the ground ready to enter the fray. I was feeling rather confident and ready to go. I met up with Happy as I arrived in the middle and he offered the following sage advice: “They are keeping low, so get on the front foot as much as possible. This bloke (Healy) swings the occasional one in too”. So keeping all that in mind, I faced up to my first delivery and as is my custom lately, the ball thudded off my pads for leg byes.

Waiting for the next delivery, bat in the air, eyes fixed on the bowler.

It was rather noticeable that the Parkville bowlers were considerably younger than ours lads. In fact, most of them looked like they had yet to start shaving. I faced up next over to the other Parkville change bowler and eventually I got a delivery angled into my problem area of my pads and lo and behold, I played a nice fore arm jab to the vacant mid on area for a single to get off the mark. It goes to show, all those leg bruising practice sessions with Happy and the bowling machine were starting to pay off.

My sole concern was when I set off for my first single, I immediately strained anew my right quadricep muscle. “Just great” I thought to myself – "this injury never seems to go away". The big positive (if there was one) is that Happy is a leisurely runner between wickets, thus it would be unlikely that I would be called through for any sharp singles.

The bowling was tight over the next couple of overs and I accumulated another two and a single all scored with the same on drive to the vacant mid on region that had hitherto been a no fly zone for me due to my technical weakness in that area. So, I was starting to feel good about the world and confident that these bowlers had no hidden tricks up their sleeve that would duly worry me.

Mid pitch discussion between overs with "Happy". I seem to be inspecting the toe of my bat, but I am actually quietly informing Happy that I have strained my quad muscle again.

What was this business of the pitch keeping low and this young chap Healy swinging the occasional one in that Happy was warning against? It was all under control as far as I could see. In fact, the only alarm had come when an errant throw from the Parkville square leg fielder smashed into my right shoulder blade as I was completing a run at the strikers end. It was a searing blow that caused me to drop my bat after making my ground. Sportingly the Parkville wicket keeper and the offending fielder came over to check if I was alright and to offer their contrition, but I could see the funny side to it all and waved them away with the words that I was OK.

The moment of impact. I am propping with pain as the ball has hit me on the shoulder blade from a wayward throw from the outfield.

Then much to my surprise, the umpires called “drinks” at the twenty over mark, not the usual twenty third over as is customary in forty five over games. This was to cost me at least another three overs of getting my eye in before playing some expansive strokes.

As I took a quick drink Strachany wondered over to Happy and I and told us (while all the while looking at me in the eye) to “push things along”. I was staggered as I was still relatively new to the crease. However, I was under no illusions he was talking to me and me only as Happy is not a big shot player and cannot change his game no matter what the circumstances.

I am not a big shot player either, preferring to stroke the ball around. The only “big” shots I possess in my armoury are the cut shot, the pull shot and the hook shot as I am essentially a back foot player. Big rain maker drives and hoicks to cow corner are simply not part of my game, but what could I do now? I mentioned my sore quad more in the hope that Strachany would understand that I was more intent on placing the ball around rather than outright brutalizing it...however, my protestations fell on deaf ears as Strachany’s next words were “it’s death or glory, go out swinging mate, it is only forty overs each today”. Later, after I was dismissed, I was to find out that it was in actual fact, a forty five over game as per normal though Strachany couldn't have known this at the time.

I was feeling rather like a sacrificial lamb at this stage and I couldn’t help thinking as I made my way back to the crease why I was being asked to throw my wicket away – because while the directive was seemingly to both batsman, there was no way that Happy would throw his wicket away for anyone no matter what the circumstances and the state of the game. Why me? I was starting to feel comfortable and I could feel a big innings coming, a good solid fifty or sixty on which to build my confidence for the rest of the season.

The first ball after drinks I duly pulled away for four runs as was my directive to play aggressively. While it was satisfying to smash a boundary from a not altogether bad ball, I was already thinking how long would I be able to keep this up before I would make a mistake? It was going to be a game of Russian Roulette, but with bat and ball instead of revolver. The next ball was not quite short enough and too close to my body to cut, but I tried to anyway and I only succeeded in bunting the ball straight down onto the pitch for no run.

The third ball was pitched invitingly about six inches outside the line of off stump at a nice length to aim a huge off drive. I had decided that as it was slightly wide of my stumps I could risk a big swipe at it as if I missed, it would likely pass harmlessly past my stumps. Moreover, as I bat a meter out of my crease, I was confident that even if by some miracle it jagged back in, it would surely bounce over my wicket. So, keeping all that in mind in the nanosecond I had to make up my mind that I was going for a big drive, I put one big stride down the wicket and swung my bat through in a huge arc. To my horror, the ball did swing in alarmingly and by playing through the line I missed and the ball somehow kept low enough that it clipped my off stump about a third of the way up.

For a bowler to pitch a delivery six or so inches outside off stump and then make it dart back in to clip off stump was world class unto itself. The fact that it also kept low so it would not harmlessly bounce over the top of the stumps was nothing short of astonishing. I congratulated the bowler after the game on his great delivery and he actually apologized with the words "it is the best ball I have ever bowled in my life". No need to apologize mate - I am still in awe.

When you consider that from the stumps to the popping crease it is nearly a meter and half. Factor in that I bat about a meter out of my crease and that the ball bounced a further meter and half in front of me when I lurched forward to drive. That would mean that the ball bounced at the very least three and half meters from the wickets and still did not bounce over the stumps as you would reasonably expect. The bowler certainly intended to bowl an inswinger, but there was no way known he could have anticipated that the ball would skid through so low and hit my off stump about half way up. Not even the top of the off stump mind you!

Simply unreal.

Playing a defensive push to cover.

Unlike other weeks, this time I was extremely angry with myself and my over optimistic shot selection. I was rendered hors de combat by a ball that was far too good to be disrespected by my overly ambitious attempt at crashing an off drive to a ball that seamed off the pitch almost sideways and kept low in the bargain.

In any normal course of events, I would have thrust my arched defensive bat with my front pad somewhere near. Even in the likely event that I played down the wrong line (it was an excellent ball after all), I most likely would have inside edged the delivery either into my pad where the ball would have probably bounced harmlessly away or if I played with the bat in front of the pad, the ball may have even squirted away to square leg and a possible single.

Either way, I would have lived to fight another day, but alas, it was not to be and I was out for a very brief innings of eight. I really did feel there were many more runs left in me this day.

In any case, after watching the bombastic stroke play of my successor, Chris “CC” Connelly, I quickly realized I was merely hors d’oeuvres to the main course served up by this leviathan’s Sunday afternoon matinee display of power hitting. Chris Connelly has been playing at South Yarra for some years, but has only in recent times started to show the latent talent that has remained hidden until now.

“CC” is about six foot three in height with huge shoulders. In height and build he reminds very much of a right handed Matthew Hayden and his short back and sides and protruding ears make CC look like a throw back to the ANZAC’s. I could easily picture him in a slouch hat and khaki in a sepia tinted photo.

Almost from the first ball he faced, CC was smacking the ball to all parts of the ground like a kid playing in his backyard. No bowler was safe from punishment as he thrust his front foot down the pitch and swung his bat like a wood choppers axe.

Chris Connelly bludgeoned his way to sixty seven in little more than about seventeen overs. There was no finessing and the innings was not chanceless by any means, but boy, did this man give the ball a serious whack. When CC hit the ball, it stayed hit and many of his best hits bounced over the boundary with ease. But for some inspired fielding by at least one of the Parkville boundary riders, CC would have scored many, many more runs. All these fireworks from a bloke who rarely even shows up to training!

Finally, Parkville introduced to the attack a young slightly built South African lad by the name of Daniel Bense as their fifth change bowler. They obviously either didn’t think much of the boys bowling, or they had not seen him bowl before, because Bense immediately sprang to notice by uprooting the obdurate Brian “Happy” Hannon’s middle stump. Happy had made a laborious thirty nine when he was finally dismissed in the thirty fifth over of the innings, but his stubborn vigil had ensured that our innings was to at least attain a level of respectability.

The hitherto unheralded Bense was bowling appreciably faster than his Parkville comrades and from a height of no more than five foot nine generated surprising speed and bounce which first unnerved, then decimated our middle order which folded before this unexpected onslaught. CC’s great knock ended when he was bowled by Bense, then hero of Round Two against Canterbury - Conrad de Souza fell LBW to Bense. The rest sadly were mown down with Sam “Fairfax” Mitchell-Head perhaps a trifle unlucky that a chest high full toss he bunted straight back to the bowler (Bense yet again) was not called a no ball and Timmy “Corky” Miller getting a thick edge on the ball en-route to his pad being given LBW (also Bense).

Only Strachany managed to avoid becoming a victim of Bense’s onslaught as he was run out for a “diamond” duck when he took on the Parkville fielders arm going for a sharp single. The Parkville man had one stump to aim at from about fifteen meters and he duly hit the target running the unfortunate Strachany out by about a meter.

Bense had finished with the remarkable figures of 7 for 17 off just short of eight overs. All that his teammates had known of him was that he was a hard hitting batsman who had scored seventy two the previous week in the fourths. It was sensational stuff, but the multi talented Bense was not finished yet on what was to prove to be an auspicious day for the youngster from Durban.

Parkville commenced their innings chasing a challenging 165 to win. A reasonable total, but probably forty or so short of what it looked like it would be when “CC” was in full flight and the score was 2 for 125. The loss of eight wickets for forty runs was a dramatic collapse that changed the momentum of the game.

Bobby Fisher and Conrad De Souza opened the bowling, but no break through came as the Parkville batsmen showed great resolve in chasing the target. The score had reached none for forty three with danger-man Andy McGregor on thirty eight doing all the scoring. I could sense that all our lads were thinking “how are we going to get a wicket here?”

In such situations, I always imagine myself taking a diving catch to lift my team mates. I want the ball to come to me every ball because I want that match defining moment to come my way. The reality is that the ball usually comes along the ground and I am required only to perform teh mundane task of saving some runs, but today, it was different.

McGregor who was looking set for a very big score was batting beautifully and had not given us a single chance when he flashed at one just wide of his off stump from the bowling of Conrad “Conair” De Souza. The ball was keeping low, so it was not really high enough to cut, so McGregor hit the ball from slightly lower than stump height getting a thickish edge which flew no more than a foot and half off the ground and dropping fast to me at gully.

I instinctively realized that the ball was about to bounce about six feet in front of me when I dived full stretch forward to get both my hands under the ball by now not much more than an inch or two above the turf. As the ball smacked into my hands, I suddenly realized that every other time in my life when I had attempted a diving catch, the ball always jolted from my hands as my elbows hit the ground, so somehow I lurched into a death roll to protect my elbows as much as possible from the full impact of landing on the ground.

As my roll ended with the ball still clasped firmly in one of my hands, I found myself looking up to the sky. I suddenly realized in a flash that perhaps the umpires might think that I had taken the catch on the bounce and thus was not celebrating because it was not out. So while still prostrate on my back I threw the ball triumphantly into the air and as I laid there watching the ball heading heaven wards, I could hear the whoops of joy from my team mates. All of the above happened inside two seconds. How my brain processed everything and in perfect synergy triggered all the correct movements and trajectory of my diving body while making mental adjustments in a flash is simply amazing. It is also living proof that I can write a lot about a little!

I got to my feet just in time to be mobbed from all directions by appreciative team mates and an overjoyed Conrad who blurted out in the magic of the moment “I could kiss you”. Not macho stuff…but under the circumstances, I completely understood, though I did shoot back “a hand shake will do Conair!” I also blurted out "my wifes going to kill me when she sees how dirty I am" as I inspected my now less than pristine whites to much accompanying laughter from the boys.

Looking around at the smiling faces of my team mates, I could see in their eyes the look of renewed hope. It was as the pundits claim “a shift in momentum”. I could feel the energy levels rise.

While I had imagined myself in the overs leading up to the key moment taking a diving catch, I had actually imagined taking a sideways diving catch. Not one where I had to dive forward to a ball that was travelling fast and not carrying. The degree of difficulty was harder than what I imagined myself doing, but if I tried to imagine myself taking such a catch as transpired, I would have doubted myself and my head would have been filled with negative thoughts of dropping a catch.

In truth, the catch itself was as a result of the long hours practicing catching at both Tuesday and Thursday training sessions (our first out doors for the year). At both sessions I participated in catching drill after catching drill until my hands were throbbing with pain and my right palm going purple from bruising. I also badly jarred two fingers, one of which I still cannot bend properly nearly a week on.

But, the practice helped. If the catch came a week earlier, I would not have caught it. I either would have let it bounce in front of me and taken it on the bounce and no one would have thought any less of me. Or if by some chance I did dive, it would have bounced out of my hands.

The value of hours of practice, in some cases painful and unpleasant, gave me one of my greatest feelings on a cricket field.

Back to the game, the in coming Parkville batsman was the redoubtable Craig Baulch who had held us up last week with a well made thirty. How Harry Potter didn’t kill him is a testament to Baulch’s ducking skills. He yet again batted well and this time he made forty five before he got too adventurous and he skied a delivery from Johnny Scurry to Chris Connelly at backward point.

In the interim however, the other junior opener was dismissed by being bowled by John Scurry in the middle of a purple patch before he was to be later man handled along with our other bowlers in the partnership of the match. With the dismissal of Baulch, Parkville were 3 for 107 and still requiring fifty nine runs in about sixteen overs. A challenging task if we could keep the pressure up.

Strachany then grabbed the wicket of Foletta leaving Parkville 4 for 112 and I am sure we all started thinking that the initiative had again tipped further in our favour. Parkville batsman Stu Mills was joined at the crease by bowling hero Danial Bense. Mills must be about six foot four tall and one hundred and twenty kilos. A veritable man mountain. He contrasted sharply with Bense who as stated earlier is about five foot nine and would have to run around the shower to get wet.

The two Parkville batsmen then set about dismantling our bowling in an assault that was as brutal as it was unexpected. Both batsmen seemed to have little trouble in not only finding the boundary, but in many cases clearing it by a long way. Mills made fifty four not out to see Parkville home, though he was dropped on at least one occasion. Bense the seven wicket hero was dismissed for a barn storming forty five which included four big sixes. One of which cleared both our boundary riders on the “fat”side of the ground (the pavilion end) when they were standing on the chalk. The ball cleared the boundary, the embankment and narrowly averted killing the scorers. The pint sized South African proved to be an inspired cricketer who is easily better than the level he was selected to play.

Parkville requiring nearly four runs an over after the loss of their fourth wicket with sixteen or so overs to play, passed our total with ten overs to spare and then continued onto the fortieth over where they finally declared with the fall of Benses wicket and the score resting on 5 for 210.

Even though we played much better than the week before, we were yet again hammered. The depth of Parkville was either astonishing or they simply have no idea what they have on their hands with some of the players playing their first or second game of the year against us.

Yet again I felt absolutely devastated to have lost. It is apparent that we are appreciably older on a per capita basis than most of our opponents, but the gulf in age between our bowlers and Parkvilles attack was stark.

At the end of the game back in the club house, Strachany kept an upbeat, positive perspective on the days events. Chris Connelly was easily man of the match for the Yarras and got to drink his hard earned free beer from the pewter goblet. The encouragement award which isn’t actually an award per se, just an honourable mention went surprisingly to me for my catch and all round effort in the field as well as my effort to keep the talk up.

I actually am not a talker on the field (though a prolific one off it), but constant encouragement is a necessity to keep spirits up on the field. Strachany is our resident cheer leader who keeps the onfield chatter going even when others tire and go quiet. I had noticed when Strachany is bowling and thus unable to be the cheer leader because of the concentration required to bowl, we go all quiet. So I stepped up to keep the chat going, particularly when Strachany was bowling.

It is one of the more unglamorous facets of the game – but everybody has to do it.

Irrespective, sitting back in the club room, I was shattered and wondering how we can get on the winners list. I also was annoyed that I had failed with the bat two weeks in a row. I need a big score and I need it soon. I am batting well, but so far the score book is not showing it. However, I know the big score will come, I just hope it comes soon.

See you all next week!

Vic Nicholas
Melbourne

N Williams b S Healy 10
B Hannanb D Bense 39
VJ Nicholas b S Healy 8
C Connellyb D Bense 67
CA De Souza lbw b D Bense 5
S Mitchell-Head c & b D Bense 3
A Mehta c DJ Marson b D Bense 0
*D Strachan run out(G Foletta)0
T Miller lbw b D Bense 1
J Scurry b D Bense 0
R Fisher not out 0
Extras (0nb,16w,8b,8lb) 32

Total 165
Overs 45

ROUND THREE – PARKVILLE CC

Looking focused during throw downs before going out to bat.

"He that is afraid of bad luck never knows good"
~Russian Proverb

After yesterdays game, I can honestly say that I have experienced almost everything that the game of cricket can throw up in terms of ways to be dismissed. The score book will say:

VJ. Nicholas Bowled 0

But in no way does it convey the drama and the freakish nature of the dismissal when read as such.

I arrived at our home ground nearly an hour before the start of play and the lads were already engaged in catching practice when I walked up with my kit bag slung across my shoulder. I said my hellos and then I strolled out to take a look at the pitch because there had been some drenching rains during the week. As soon as I saw the wicket I noticed it had a green tinge to it. Now everything I have ever read about green wickets is that they favour seam bowlers and offer some movement and bounce.

The round one match played here a fortnight ago offered up a feather bed wicket with true bounce and no hidden tricks. Last week at Canterbury we were served up an almost Sub-Continent style slow and low bounce deck which offered nothing to the bowlers at all.

How would I have to adjust my game to deal with this pitch? I thought to myself. I spoke to Brian “Happy” Hannon – our resident veteran and he simply told me to get my front foot forward as much as possible. “Just great”, I thought to myself – that is pretty much the same advice I was given for the first two weeks and they were vastly different pitches to this seam friendly pitch.

Strachany lost the toss and duly informed us that the opposition had put us in to bat. I rushed off to pad up still trying to figure out how the pitch would behave in the opening half hour. Once padded up I made my way outside and decided to face some throw downs to get my eye in, but again, I had to give this up after a few minutes as it made me sick with nerves all of a sudden.

I waited on the grassy embankment for the fielding team and umpires to make their way to the middle and summon us out. When the time came, Happy and I made our way out with not much being said other than Happy offering to take strike to the first ball.

Walking out to the crease.

The opening delivery of the day delivered by the Parkville fast bowler flashed by Happy’s off stump and Happy let it go. The next delivery sailed down the leg side for a wide and beat the diving keeper. I set off on a run and yelled out to Happy “there is two if you want it?”, but as I turned to charge back down the pitch for the second run, I noticed that Happy had his back still turned and had only just made it to the bowlers end. So one bye it was.

I then looked around the field to see where each fielder was placed and in my customary habit I did not bother taking middle. I just stood one meter out of my crease and faced up to the next ball. The Parkville fast bowler then promptly sent down a wide down the off side which I left alone and then I held out my arms signaling a wide to the umpire who then did the same towards the scorers.

I don’t know what made me do that, as I think it would just irritate the opposition. I thought to myself, don’t do that again – don’t give them any ammunition. The next delivery was an absolute corker – it pitched short of a length, cutting into me sharply off the pitch and beat my bat thudding into my thigh pad. The “ooohhhhs” of the opposition fieldsmen sounded out and I thought to myself “great ball mate – but, you aren’t going to get me out bowling there”.

The next ball was also short of a length, but this time just outside off stump and it took off from the green pitch passing me at about chest height. I was momentarily tempted to have a flash at it, but withdrew my bat at the last moment as I realized it was slightly too close to my chest to get my arms free to cut. As the ball smacked into the keepers gloves the fielders “ooohhhss” went up again in unison. This time the first slip shot out “this bloke hasn’t got any idea”, to which I shot back, “yeah, I have no clue” with a broad smile on my face. I have always found that the best way to diffuse opposition sledging is to agree with it in a jocular manner and the keeper and first slip smiled back looking slightly sheepish.

The next ball fizzed harmlessly by through to the keeper having been pitched short and wide. Infact, I expected it to be called a wide, but this time the umpire vacillated and did not call the wide. Yet another ball flashed by in a similar manner, though this one was somewhat closer to my off stump, but not close enough for me to again let the ball pass harmlessly by.

The bowler then bounded in and pitched one short of a length, but this time speared into my body, but I got behind it and I played the ball down towards short mid wicket off the middle of my bat where the fieldsman picked it up and there was no run as the umpire called “over”.

Happy and I met mid pitch and Happy offered “It was great that you left the wide stuff alone…wait until you get your eye in”. I nodded and we went back to our respective ends. The other opening bowler was a tallish left arm pace bowler. His first ball was short and happy guided the ball around the corner to fine leg for an easy single.

I am sharing a joke with the umpire at the non-strikers end.

I prepared myself to face up to the next delivery. I again stood a meter out of my crease to cancel out any chance of LBW and also to reduce the possibility of getting bowled if I had a swing and a miss. Bowling from the other side of the wicket, I made the mental note to open up my stance a bit so I would be a bit more front-on to the left arm bowler. He charged in and let fly with an over pitched Yorker that speared in to my pads.

Did it swing in through the air?

I don’t honestly know as it all happened in a blur. Happy told me later that it did swing in through the air, but I couldn't say if it did. The ball missed my bat and front leg and hit my back foot on the half volley and I turned around in time to see it deflect to the first slip fieldsman who caught it to much excitement of the watching wicket keeper.

The appeal went up loud, but I was not alarmed…surely, it was sliding down leg side and would not be LBW…and I didn’t hit it, so I can’t be out caught either. The umpire stood and stared momentarily and then he started walking towards the square leg umpire seeking some kind of confirmation. I thought to myself, “well I am not LBW here…he is thinking maybe I hit it…” and after what seemed and eternity but was probably no more than a dozen seconds, the umpire raised his finger and gave me out much to my chagrin.

I stood there momentarily and feebly asked “how am I out?”, to which the Parkville wicket keeper shot back “look at your stumps” and as I looked back, I noticed that the leg bail was gently resting on the ground.

How did it get there?

There hadn’t been any sudden gust of wind? It must have come off when the ball deflected off my toe?

As I walked off, I tried to digest what had just taken place. The ball had hit my toe on the half volley and then en-route to the first slips hands it had barely clipped my leg bail dislodging it almost without anyone seeing it at first. If the fielding team had seen it, they would not have bothered appealing to the umpire – they simply would have rushed to embrace their successful bowler. The bowler seemed to appeal for LBW and the fielders appealed for the catch – it was the square leg umpire who noticed that the bail had been dislodged in all this commotion.

It was a freak dismissal of the likes that I could play cricket another twenty years and never again experience anything like it again. I was flummoxed, but I also was too shocked to be angry with myself for playing over the top of what should have been a gift ball to turn away for runs. I just shook my head and shrugged my shoulders at the freaky nature of it all.

That is the beauty of cricket. One mistake – and you are consigned to watching for the rest of the afternoon. I took a while to make sense of it all before I went inside the darkened pavilion to remove my padding. As I removed the last remnants of my bodily protection, I was shocked to see Nat “Mr Natural” Williams starting to also take his pads off. He had gone in and had promptly got out soon after for a duck as well. Oh dear!

Brent "Harry" Potter playing a delicate glide past second slip.

By this stage going in at number four was Brent “Harry” Potter a strapping lad of New Zealander origins. Harry Potter is someone that should be playing First grade – he is that good – however, as the Firsts play on Saturdays, due to work commitments, Harry plays Fourths on Sundays where his prodigious talents dwarf his less talented opponents (and teammates).

Harry – a left hander - announced his arrival and his bellicose intentions by getting off the mark in the most emphatic fashion possible – by smiting a massive straight driven six back over the bowlers head. “Way to go Harry” I thought to myself.

Brent "Harry" Potter playing a typically belligerent stroke.

Harry then smashed two further boundaries as well as running a single in somewhere amongst that. The boy was clearly in commanding form, being fresh from smashing a spectacular century in Round One for the Fourths and then when the Firsts played on last Sunday, he again was imperious with a match winning thirty three. On fifteen, Harry caught the malaise that had afflicted Nat and myself by being bowled by a straight delivery.

"How did I miss that?" Strachany appears to be thinking.

Strachany followed soon later – bowled for two and with the score sitting on a precarious 4 for 34, things were starting to look a bit grim to say the least. Happy who had been up the other end while all this carnage was being played out was finally out for a pain staking nine which he had compiled in a vigil that had lasted for twenty five overs. Under the circumstances, it was exactly the sort of grit we needed to overcome our situation.

Richard "Dragon" Halpagoda gets off the mark with a classic square cut for four.

Richie “Dragon” Halpagoda was the next to go for seven and the score on fifty three. New boy fill in Richie “Tricky” Dahlsen was then also dismissed for seven with the score on fifty nine. By this stage the batting collapse was in full swing. Amit Mehta was the next to go - controversially given out LBW when he smashed the cover off the ball on its way onto his pad. Justin Southern, another new lad was dismissed for eleven and the score on seventy six and that was where it ended as the last man Johnny Scurry was trapped plumb in front of his stumps first ball to a delivery that smashed into his calf just behind his pad that left him contorting in agony.

Richard "Dragon" Halpagoda playing with a straight bat.

All out for seventy six off thirty five overs. A full ten overs less than our allotted forty five. It was a shambolic batting performance – eight batsmen bowled and two LBW. Only Amit Mehta could consider himself truly unlucky in that he was given out to one that he edged onto his pad.

Richard "Dragon" Halpagoda leaving one through to the keeper.

As for the insinuation by some of the lads that I was unlucky, I personally felt that despite the freaky end result of my dismissal – it was none the less still an error on my behalf in failing to deal with a delivery that was arrowed into my one main weakness. A weakness which I have been attempting to address with Happy in the sessions with the bowling machine at Hawthorn Indoor nets. Not good enough.

After the lunch interval, we made our way out onto the field, but despite all the positive chat, I don’t think anyone really believed we were a chance to knock Parkville over for less than our total. However, a few quick wickets will usually change the mind set of a team and all of a sudden belief will come back fast.

Lining up to take the first over with the new ball was Harry Potter. I had faced him in the nets and he is appreciably faster than any of the blokes who play Fifth Eleven cricket. As I mentioned earlier, he is really a First Eleven quality cricketer. Harry bowls left arm express deliveries off a modest run up. But even off that run up, Harry generates a lot of pace. The first delivery that Harry sent down absolutely exploded off the pitch and flew through to the keeper Strachany who was standing back much, much further than to our usual bowlers at chest height. Strachany was filling in in-lieu of Timmy Miller who was seconded to a higher grade.

After this delivery an extra slip and a second gully were added giving us a slips cordon of four – easily the most you will see in Fifth Eleven cricket. The second delivery also exploded off the pitch and flew past the batsmen who meekly hung his bat out to a delivery he barely would have seen. This was pulsating stuff and I was starting to think that if we could break through early, maybe, just maybe we could be in with an outside chance. The next delivery smashed into the bat handle as the batsman tried to protect himself from the ball smashing into his face and the ball deflected away to fine leg for a single.

Harry was not impressed and he stalked back to his bowling mark and he turned around like a raging bull and charged in and bowled a hum dinger of a ball that pitched on off stump thus committing the hapless Parkville batsman to a stroke. The ball took a thick outside edge off the bat and flew like a tracer bullet to gully where Johnny Scurry held a wonderful catch at waste height.

One for one! We charged in from all directions to mob Harry and Johnny as this was exactly the start we needed. This was hostile fast bowling at its exhilarating best from Harry. The first ball to the new batsman also took off from short of a length and whizzed passed the edge of his bat.

The next over, new boy Justin Southern began with three wild deliveries - he hadn’t played any cricket for a while – but as soon as he found his radar, Justin also had the batsmen playing and missing with his fast deliveries. Hardly any runs seem to come from the middle of the bat with the ball flying off edges. Harry then took up where he left off the previous over beating the bat at will ball after ball with extreme pace. The only thing preventing him getting any further wickets was the fact that the batsmen were simply not good enough to even get any bat on ball at all most of the time. When the batsmen rarely did make contact, the ball would fly off the edge of the bat through the slips, over the slips and at least in one instance, under the slips.

I thought to myself that it must only be a matter of time before wickets started tumbling, but miraculously, they didn’t. Some how the Parkville batsmen stuck around and they did not lose another wicket until they only needed a couple runs to win.

The only interest left in the game was when Strachany asked Harry to bowl the last over before drinks and Harry at first mildly protested that he wasn’t up for it, but after some gentle persuasion from the master psychologist that is Strachany, Harry took the ball and unleashed one of the fieriest, angriest overs one could ever see. He bowled a full over of bouncers and throat balls that the bemused Parkville batsman managed to duck and weave through. Given that Harry Potter is a mild mannered sort of bloke, it was not exactly clear what had triggered this Bodyline attack in what turned out to be his last over. Even more incredible was the fact that neither umpire cautioned Harry for intimidatory bowling. It was fast, it was furious and for the batsman, I am sure it must have been scary.

It was not too long after drinks that the Parkville batsmen duly notched a crushing win. It would have been great to end the game there and then…a kind of mercy rule – but unfortunately due to percentage etc, the game had to continue until the forty fifth over was bowled. The next hour and a half was the longest ninety minutes I have ever experienced on a cricket field. It seemed to drag on for ever, but to the lads credit, they fought it out to the end. Harry showed his professionalism by chasing down hits to the deep and rifling in his throws to the keeper. I had nothing but admiration for the bloke trying his guts out to the very end. Strachany bowled his guts out as well – he truly does set a gutsy example as skipper and I could not help but silently respect his commitment to playing out the game with intensity until the last ball bowled.

Ah yes, the last ball bowled was bowled by me. Strachany was sporting enough to allow me three overs at the end of the innings and it felt good to get more real match experience to help me bridge the gap between my net bowling and my match bowling. I have been suffering from nerves when I run into bowl, but little by little I am starting to regain my match readiness.

As a young lad I used to run in and bowl fast...and I did it well. Somewhere down the line I have lost all ability with the ball in my hands. My fast days are well and truly over now – so I am trying to reinvent myself into an off spinner to lend the team with more variety. With some hard work, I am hopeful I can keep an end tight and maybe even take some wickets. Time will tell.

As for this particular game – it ended up being a rather heavy defeat that set back our aspirations quite a bit.

However, next week is a different game and surely we cannot be far away from our first win of the season.

Here’s hoping!

See you soon,
Vic Nicholas
Melbourne

Canterbury Tales - Round 2

Yarras Fifth Eleven: Tim Miller, Vic Nicholas, Stuart McDonald, Amit Mehta, Sam Mitchell-Head, Brian Hannon, Conrad De Souza, Robert Fisher, Gideon Haigh and John Scurry. Absent from photo - David Strachan (Captain).

"It is inevitable that some defeat will enter even the most victorious life. The human spirit is never finished when it is defeated...it is finished when it surrenders"
~ Ben Stein (1944- ) American Actor, writer and political commentator.

This weeks game will be remembered by me for pretty much all the wrong reasons.

For the second week running we batted better than the opposition and somehow conspired to lose. We took nine opposition wickets for the second week running and following on from last week where we lost only five wickets in making our total, we again only lost five wickets in our run chase.

Think about it for a moment – we have taken eighteen opposition wickets and lost only ten. Yet we have somehow lost both games!

This week I had the added distraction of having to wake up earlier than normal two days in a row as I was having my kitchen renovated. So I arrived at Canterbury’s home ground at 11:45am in a less than perfectly refreshed frame of mind.

Strachany rallying the troops.

“No problem” I thought to myself. I am not going into this game under an injury cloud like last week. I at the very least felt A1.

We had some close catching drills to sharpen our reflexes and get everyone switched on. Then we performed a drill whereby the ball is hit out to you from a distance of about thirty five metres so we could run in attack the ball and then throw it in to the keeper.

The first one hit out to me bobbled off the sparse tufts of grass, but I fielded it OK and I sent my return into the keeper. My throwing arm needs a lot of work I might add, but I haven’t had much opportunity to work on my fielding much yet as we have been training indoors so far.

Pre-game catching practice. Johnny Scurry holds a sharp chance.

The next one hit out to me, I again kneeled down to field it when I felt a sharp twinge in both thighs when I got up and threw the ball back to Timmy our keeper. As I went to the back of the queue, I suddenly realized that all was not well. Both my quadriceps were hurting like hell.

I have always laughed at blokes who get injured during a pre-game warm up drill – and as karma is no great friend of mine at times, it was this day that Mr Karma decided to pay me a visit and I had done what I thought was unthinkable – I had incapacitated myself during a pre-game warm up!

As luck was to have it, Strachany won the toss and put the opposition in to bat. Just great! I was going to have to field for forty five overs before testing my now suspect quads while batting.

I usually field at point/gully to right handers and square leg/backward square leg to left handers. As fate would have it, the Canterbury ground is rather large oval with one side being so big that even test players would struggle to belt a four much less a six to that side of the ground. It was to this side of the ground that I was forced into long, long chases that I simply could not give up because they were never going to reach the boundary and a batsman could run a five by the time a ball is returned.

With each chase, my quads started aching more and more. With each kneel to get my body behind a shot coming in my direction, I winced in pain. It got to the point that I was trying to field the ball while just bending my back rather than kneel down. I also waited for the ball to reach me on more than one occasion rather than attack the ball as it was agony to try and field normally. I am sure my team mates must have been wondering – “what the hell is wrong with VB today?” I would have loved to have gone off, but we do not bother with such trivialities like having a substitute fielder. So I had to just endure as best as I could.

Legendary Richmond iron man Francis Bourke receiving treatment back in his playing days. Circa 1980.

Canterbury is a team of classy veterans and some extremely young tyros. One of the Canterbury players is none other than the legendary Australian Football League legend Francis Bourke who played 300 games for Richmond Football Club from 1967 to 1981. Francis Bourke was not only a sublimely skilled footballer, but he also was perhaps as courageous as any player to have ever played the game. Bourke’s ability to continue playing beyond the threshold of pain was legendary having played a game with a broken leg in 1971 which was to subsequently sideline him for nine weeks. Bourke was also involved in another legendary incident in 1980 which entered football folklore when in an important match at Arden Street against North Melbourne Bourke in a collision with a team mate received a gash to his forehead which quickly saturated his face with blood which in turn seeped onto his guernsey. In those days there was no “blood rule” that requires a bleeding player to leave the field until the bleeding is stopped and Bourke shifted to the forward line. Although he could barely see through the oozing blood, he still managed to dive full-length to take a mark and then kick an important goal to ensure Richmond had a narrow win.

Francis Bourke was named on the wing in 1996 in the AFL Team of the Century and in 2005 he was named as one of only four “Immortals of the Richmond Football Club”.

Here he was walking out to open the batting for Canterbury C Grade, sixty two years old, bespectacled, but in my eyes – a legend. To those of us in the know, it was truly a humbling experience just to be on the same playing arena as the great man, to others in our team, I am sure they were wondering what the fuss was all about.

Francis Bourke made his name legend on the football field, but Francis Bourke is also a more than handy cricketer. He batted carefully and with authority and held us at bay for nearly an hour and half in compiling a patient twenty seven before he was dismissed by our surprise packet off spinner Amit Mehta when the great man was bowled by a skidding off break. It was the beginning of an auspicious day for our quiet and humble off spinner who ripped the heart out of the Canterbury top order who had hitherto defied our pace men on a rather benign wicket.

Infact the first ball of day drew puffs of dust from our paceman Stuie “Disco” McDonald. I thought to myself “Uh oh…this is a dry, dead wicket…our bowlers are in for back breaking day today”. I have never seen our pacemen exert so much energy for so little reward. The only positive was that the low, slow bounce was also stymieing the batsmen as well who were finding it difficult to get the ball away.

Conrad got the break through in his first over at first change with a full toss that was spooned to Amit who took a fine catch on what was to prove to be his day. Sometime later as it dawned on Strachany that pacemen were not causing any difficulties to the batsmen, Strachany threw the ball to our off spinners Amit and Gideon Haigh.

Our off spinners are a contrast in style with Gideon firing his off spinners in on a very tight line and length and Amit being a bit more erratic in his approach from bowling the occasional wide and full toss to bowling the odd almost unplayable ball. Amit Mehta took three marvelous wickets with two batsmen bowled and one edging a perfectly flighted off break to Bobby Fisher at first slip who took a first class catch. We were cock-a-hoop and I shouted “shabash” (“well done” in Hindi) to Amit at each celebration. I was genuinely delighted for him as Amit is such a lovely bloke.

Our comedian, errr, captain Strachany then mopped up the Canterbury tail with an inspired spell of seam up medium pace bowling taking three wickets for twenty six. In between Amit’s and Strachany’s heroics, Mark Thomas, one of Canterbury’s “grey power” brigade made an inspired fifty seven when he was involved in one of the more unluckier dismissals of the summer so far. Thomas was at the non strikers end when his fellow batsmen clouted a shot that neatly bisected Gideon and myself at point and cover respectively and raced through to the “fat” side of the ground. I had no option but to give chase in eye watering pain all of the way as my quadriceps felt like they were being ripped out with each stride. As I ran in a goose stepping manner to try and alleviate the pain as much as possible, the Canterbury batsmen seeing my discomfort decided to run a third while I must have been a good sixty five to seventy meters from the stumps. Backing me up was Strachany who was about twenty meters behind me, so I relayed the throw to him and he in turn managed to throw the ball forty plus meters to our keeper Timmy Miller who whipped off the bails with Thomas a foot short.

Simply unbelievable on Strachany’s behalf. Not just the fantastic flat throw, but the fact that he had somehow run all the way around from mid off to back me up was quite remarkable.

Towards the end of the Canterbury innings, I knew that I was in no condition to open the batting, so I informed Strachany to drop me down the order to number five – where with some rest, I figured that I might be able to bat with out much discomfort. This was more in hope than in logic.

Canterbury finished up 9 for 179 leaving us 180 to win off forty five overs. I was pretty confident that we could reel in this total as we have a pretty good batting line up. Our run chase got off to a solid start with Gideon Haigh agreeing to step into the breach left by me and Brian “Happy” Hannon our usual opener who was back replacing Nat “Mr Natural” Williams who was unavailable this week. They batted with solid determination and the score slowly mounted. Twenty, thirty, forty, fifty…we ticked off each small milestone and dared to dream of pulling off a spectacular victory. The only nagging doubt came from the fact that despite the untroubled and at times delightful batting by Happy and Gid, we started to fall further and further behind in the run rate. Neither of the lads are natural hitters, Happy plays strictly in the “V” of mid on to mid off, while Gid bats in a classical manner with a straight bat and the most sumptuous of late cuts seen this side of the First World War.

Finally, Happy fell for a well made forty with the opening partnership having registered eighty four. One for eighty four is an awesome start to a run chase, but there was not much more than ten overs left to get the remaining ninety six for victory. The opening stand had eaten up nearly thirty five overs – a remarkable effort and a perfect start to a two day game, but in the circumstances we found ourselves in, not nearly quick enough. Though it must be said that the low slow bounce would not have helped the batsmen in the slightest.

Conrad De Souza then strode out at number three and played the innings of his life by stroking the ball around for a devil may care forty one not out in the remaining ten overs that got us to within seventeen of an unlikely victory. Upon Gid’s dismissal, Strachany strode to the wicket and unselfishly threw his wicket away in his effort to get the score board moving. We were now in kamikaze batting mode.

I began the walk to the crease upon Strachany’s dismissal and after only a few steps, I knew I was in deep trouble as both quadriceps started aching. “How am I going to get through this?” I thought to myself. When I reached the wicket I was greeted by a very determined Conrad who met me with the words “we have to run on everything so we can win this”. “This bloke certainly is made of the right stuff” I thought to myself as I nodded my head in agreement all the while wondering how I was going to survive this ordeal.

I usually bat a foot out of my crease to fast and medium pace bowlers, but here I stood a whole meter out of the crease to firstly have the ball “come on” to the bat a bit off the lifeless pitch and also to take the risk out of playing the big swing and miss. Batting so far out of the crease, it would take nearly a full toss to bowl me out if I took a swipe and missed.

Scoring my opening single with a push to cover. Conrad and I are both waiting for the ball to beat the fielder.

I scored my first run with a push through the covers. Conrad called me through for a single and I was in agony by the time I got to the other end. Conrad belted a number of two’s and we also ran some leg byes that careered off my pads. Such was my pain that I can barely remember much other than I played one sweet cut shot that I was praying would fly away for a boundary so I wouldn’t have to run – but as luck would have it, it stopped just short and we ran a three that felt akin to someone slicing the front of my thighs with a razor blade.

Conrad came up to me at the end of the over and was encouraging me to keep it up as he was really “on” and focused on winning the game from nearly an impossible position. I knew then that I wasn’t going to make it. If we needed four or five an over, I would have called for a runner as I am certain that we would have got them easily. But the ask now was mounting to beyond twelve an over and we needed someone capable of having a big swing at everything and running like a man possessed. Stuie “Disco” McDonald was promoted up the order to number six for such an eventuality, so I made the decision that I had to get off. I simply could not run and I was in too much pain to even try a “stand and deliver” smash and grab raid with a runner doing the running for me.

I signaled to the sidelines to let them know I was retiring hurt and for Disco to get on. But they couldn’t hear me because of crowd noise as there was some children’s presentation going on right next to our scorers with about one hundred and fifty kids and parents present having a BBQ – thus making it impossible to hear what was going on. As I walked closer and closer to the pavilion with my bat tucked under my arm taking off my gloves, they finally realized I was retiring hurt. The boys gave me a generous reception for coming off when not out – commending me on my selfless act. However, my decision was made up just as much out of the fact that I was in excruciating pain as the decision that I was better off making way for fit blokes to have a swing at victory.

I took off my pads nearly in tears. I was totally unable to render the team any assistance at all in circumstances where I would back myself in to at least make a fighting contribution. I stepped outside the dressing room to watch the denouement of our innings unfold with Conrad heroically making a forlorn charge at the now impossible target. We fell short by seventeen runs – probably much closer than anticipated considering how far behind the run rate we were at one stage. It brought respectability to a game we really never threatened to win.

Yet again, we only lost five wickets and yet again, we somehow conspired to lose a game against an opposition that man for man we matched up on quite well. For my part, I was to learn later that I had made seven – much more than I could remember making…for that matter, I couldn’t really remember much about my innings at all.

Most of the lads went home and some of us ended up back at our club house at Como where we tried to explain to our startled club mates how we yet again somehow managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in quite unbelievable circumstances for the second week running. Conrad and Amit were the toast all round for their outstanding contributions as were Strachany for his three wickets and Gid and Happy’s eighty four run opening stand. However, it was all rather empty as we yet again missed out on a well deserved win.

It is coming…real soon.

See you next week!
Vic Nicholas
Melbourne