Theale and Tilehurst Friendly XI vs BBC Caversham 31st July 2005

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Report by Fingers

After three of the four tour games being abandoned and the 1st XI game at Nettlebed suffering the same fate some of us were itching for a game.

On a wet pitch there was no surprise that Osman elected to field on winning the toss. The first decision to take was who was going to keep wicket and it was agreed that Cat should be put in the spotlight against his former team; he did go on to win the battle of the byes but it was felt that this was largely due to the absence of a kitchen sink in his pocket.

The early exchanges were quiet and the score had reached 25 before captain dismissed captain with Osman bowling Trevor Deeks. All the batsman struggled to score fluently against tight bowling and some people with long memories of the Tilehurst days might be surprised to learn that the most fluent of the batters was Tim Castle. His innings though ended with possibly one of the most outstanding pieces of cricket any one will have seen in many years; the only problem is that words won't do it justice.

Chilly was bowling to Tim who mistimed an on drive which barely went off the cut strip at the bowlers end. Recognising that runs were desperately needed he called for a single; Chilly already had the ball in his hands but slipped over and contemplated throwing the ball at the stumps but decided he could make it to them before Tim despite being flat on the ground. Chilly then did an impression of a man in the desert crawling towards a mirage and in the end fell in to the stumps only moments before Tim finally arrived.

The BBC innings was never really able to accelerate and off their 44 overs made 118-8, an apparently low total but one that would not necessarily be easy to chase.

Rog and Chilly opened up and after a couple of lusty blows Rog was the first to go in his typical manner, for those not familiar with this it is having a go at a length ball just outside off stump and spooning a catch up in to the off side ring. There was some discussion after his dismissal about what proportion of his innings ended in this manner, I suggested that it was two-thirds of his innings but Rog said it was nothing like this but more like 7 out of 10 innings; at this stage I agreed to disagree with him.

Many of the first team had entertained themselves after the game had been abandoned on Saturday by placing small side bets on events in the second XI game, these included things such as number of misfields in an over. One of the favourites had been the number of fielders who touched the ball in an over and there was an attempt to resurrect this sideshow as T&T made slow progress in their run chase. After a couple of offerings we turned to Oneal for his guess, 15 he offered which suggested a lack of understanding of what was being bet on or a distinct feeling that some of the BBC fielders would be needing substitutes before the end of the over.

The main body of the T&T innings was a partnership of 55 between Rags and Chilly who both batted will before finally chipping up catches as they tried to up the pace. Oneal was making a welcome return to the side for his first game of the season and batted very well for 25no as he and Cat saw us home for a comfortable win by 7 wickets with 11 overs to spare.