And so to the first of the year's matches against a Watson-led team: today we ventured to Girton to play (surprise, surprise) Girton.
Fielding first we put in a scrappy performance (lots of loose balls; more misfields than the bumpy surface justified), but somehow kept Girton to 113/7. Mike Jones (2/17) and Paul Jordan (2/14) succeeded through a strategy that seemed to be based on extreme variation, and both would have had three-fors but for dropped catches, although Les Collings (1/14) was probably the pick of the bowlers. Tom Jordan (1/14) got his second ever Remnants wicket, but the true highlight was when John Young (1/15) came onto bowl after fielding about a third of all shots played. His first delivery bounced twice on the way to an apparently confused Phil Watson, who somehow managed to scoop the ball up off the deck . . . and straight to Les at mid on.
Our run chase was, once again, sluggish from the outset, and we never looked like winning. Ev Fox (23) and Joe White (15) put together the innings's only significant partnership, but both got out just when they looked like cutting loose. We were just 32/2 at the half-way mark, although that improved to 64/2 after 13.4 overs -- with 50 needed off 38 deliveries we weren't entirely out of the game . . . but we lost 5/17 in the next few overs, and it was only the lower order hitting of John Young (12*) and Mike Jones (11*) which gave our total even a semblence of respectibility.
In truth, we'd been thrashed, the most galling aspect of which was the exceptional performances of Girton's Remnants contingent: Martin Parry bowled a superb spell of 1/12 and Phil Watson took a brilliant catch -- in the process of falling backwards he somehow managed to grab the ball at ankle height before becoming fully prostrate. These two will be monitored to make sure they put the same effort in when playing for our club.
(And now it's over to The Analyst, Simon Hughes.)
The other thing that this loss highlighted was how weak Remnants' batting has been this year. At this stage of the season only five batsmen are averaging more than 26, and only one has scored more than 100 runs in total. That said, Remnants have won six of their nine completed matches (excluding the six-a-side tournament) which implies that they've been bowling rather well. And the averages do bear this out: I'll leave you with the more cheery fact that twelve Remnants bowlers (more than half of those who've been thrown the ball at all this season) are averaging under 20. Back to you, Richie.