Report by Daniel Mortlock:
First things first: today's opposition, The Philanderers, are nothing to do with Phil Watson's team of the same name (well, minus the "The"). Rather, they soon revealed themselves to be a collection of rather experienced and classy cricketers who were a bit too good for the Remnants line-up we'd put out tonight.
The Philanderers batted first, their openers putting on 92 runs in 75 balls without ever appearing to take undue risks: good balls were defended and bad balls were dispatched, but at no stage was any slogging involved. The only bowlers to have any impact were George Speller (0/18, the only bowler to concede less than a run a ball) and Julius Rix (3/33, who was on a hat trick in his first over). Julius's flurry of wickets almost got us back in the match, but it was not to be. The impotence of our bowlers, combined with some dropped catches, lacklustre fielding, moronic mistakes (a no ball for having three fielders behind square leg, anyone?) and dismal backing up, meant that The Philanderers ended up coasting along to 140/3, the highest total we'd conceded all season.
As with our other failed run chases this year, it was very quickly apparent that we weren't going to threaten the target. Dave Williams (26) and Rupert Brown (13) put together a nice opening partnership, successfully rotating the strike, but the bowling was tight enough to prevent us getting the boundaries we needed. After 13 overs we were just 65/3 and the required rate was up to an improbable 11 an over. John Young (26*), Daniel Mortlock (12) and George Speller (13) did actually manage keep us in touch for four of those overs, but soon we were losing wickets more rapidly than we were scoring runs, and in the end The Philanderers were deserved 20 run winners.
There was no bar tonight, so everyone just sort of drifted off -- kind of appropriate, given the rather nondescript nature of our surrender on the field -- so The Philanderers seem destined to remain somewhat enigmatic victors until next year.