We have been playing Rob Noble’s team for 15 or more years, and it is always a pleasant day. They have our mixture of young [yesterday two boys aged 10 and 13], old [Rob], decrepit [Cobb] and extremely capable [a left hander from Essex]. They fielded first because several had to leave early. Dennis was captain [and caterer – with Estelle – for the second week in a row] and we agreed a 35 over game, which as usual turned out to be spot on. Adam Gutch and Rupert Morris opened but could not make much headway against some tight bowling, although Adam looked about to break loose when he whacked his third ball for a big four over square leg, but it was a false dawn….we were ambling along at 3 an over when both were out trying to force the pace. Thereafter no-one really dominated the batting. Bowden […]

RICHARD WOOLHOUSE [SKIPPPER] PICKED UP Sarah’s lunch [she thought the weather too iffy to join us] and was few minutes late, so I tossed up with their affable skipper, James, which I won and elected to bat. My reasoning was that the forecast was for rain, so I thought at least we’d wallop a few before a truncated day. I also proposed a 30-over match. This was queried in both dressing rooms, but as my meteorological calculations suggested rain at 4.42 p.m., and it actually fell at 4.43 – a minute after the game finished – I felt vindicated. Our dressing room thought it was barmy to elect to bat first on a sodden but drying pitch. But there are other factors, like being able to help set out lunch etc. Anyway Sean and Nick Emley volunteered to open and faced some very tight bowling. They struggled to get runs […]

PROBABLY THE MOST PERFECT DAY AT STONOR we have had in terms of cloudless skies, sun, and complete absence of planes thanks to the Icelandic volcano.What a pain these people have been with their boring sagas, cod wars, toxic debt and now toxic ash. Martin was late so I tossed up with Euan, their captain in a 35 overs game. I lost and they elected to bat, a wise decision as it turned out. Although they started very slowly [20 after 8 overs] they soon accelerated despite two wickets from Olly Bett [both bowled] and one catch off Dennis [by Olly at point to dismiss their excellent and fearless lady opener]. But we missed 4 catches, the most important of which was a rare Morris drop at mid-on which would have seen the departure of a league cricketer who then cut loose. Peter Linthwaite dropped a couple but one was […]

A BEAUTIFUL SEPTEMBER day, sullied by a dreadful crash on the M40 which made most of us very late. The 35-over match didn’t start until 1.15 with BBQ lunch at 2.15 or so, and – because darkness threatened – no tea until after the match was won and lost. Martin Bowden, skippering against his other club, won the toss and elected to bat. Robbie Lawson, he of the 145 not out last week, and Rupert Morris opened very briskly, at 6 an over, Rupert swinging his bat to good effect and Robbie as graceful and purposeful as ever. By lunch Robbie had scored 50 and Rupert had just been out – in a stand of 70 or so – for 15. Linthwaite was advanced up the order and faced 6 balls, five of which he failed to hit while the last bowled him. This was the start of a bad […]

Turville Park is a lovely ground, surrounded by fields and sheep. Usually the corn is as high as an elephant’s eye, but this year there wasn’t any, so 35 overs took a lot less time than in years gone by – Sarah’s BBQ lunch was also not such a protracted affair as our formal Stonor lunches. Those with long memories remember Vib in his pomp whacking balls into the corn from both ends, obliging us to plant ballboys in the undergrowth to search for the wretched things – we must have lost 6. Vib now plays for HMP Parkhurst CC which is a pity. But we have Robbie Lawson. We tied a game here with the Chancers ten years ago, when I caught their last man off a wide. And we think we won our only game against the Chancers here a year or so later when my daughter Maria […]

THE HERMITS fixture is possibly our oldest, going back to 1976 perhaps [the archivist is uncertain, the scorebooks seemed to have been nicked by trophy hunters]. Many of the original Hermits, named after a pub in North London, are still playing –Tim Squires [my brother-in-law], Terry Blake [skipper] and Jerry ‘Chucker’ Bevan were all in the field on Sunday and only a little greyer and fatter. Jerry is as combative as ever, Tim may have lost mobility but makes up for any technical deficiencies with keenness, and Terry still looks like a proper cricketer, which he once was, having played for MCC Youth while Head Boy of Radley. But I don’t think he would have dropped that skier twenty years ago.Terry’s son, aged 13, now plays, Rob Kir’s and Graham Dixie’s boys – both original Hermits – also played on Sunday, and Sam Kir batted magnificently. Unfortunately the V&A sperm […]

THE JESMOND JAGUARS are a team formed while they were all at Newcastle University. They seems to have done rather well, a collection of lawyers, accountants and other professionals, and their captain – the excellent and generous Adam Chataway – is organising lottery funding for the 2012 Olympics. They are almost perfect opposition – they give us their best player when we are short and never whinge at crap umpiring decisions. They help with the tables without being asked to.Incidently, Adam Chataway arrived early and went for a 15 mile run. I don’t think this was why Adam Jacot was late. But they have two fatal flaws…they are rather good at cricket, and they are all under 30. They can run, they can catch, they can throw. They can all throw to the top of the stumps from the longest boundary. Amazing. Martin Bowden lost the toss in a 35 […]

THERE WAS AN IRONY in the Talbotians fielding eleven good men, while we only managed 9 somewhat iffy men, three being pretty crocked [Dennis, Jake and Jack] and some being a bit passed it by the look of their fielding, not mentioning any names like Rob. A couple of weeks ago their skipper, our friend Sunil, told us that they were struggling and that we should look for alternative opposition. But they persevered and found 11. On the day we had two drop out, one through a suspected dose of alcohol poisoning, which I can sympathise with, horrid business, hits you unexpectedly. The Old Talbotians, incidently, were founded by journalists on Now! magazine, an ill-fated venture by the late Sir James Goldsmith. Private Eye referred to the mag as Talbot! for some obscure reason. We started at 1.45 or so without lunch because it rained overnight and, briefly, in the […]