Remnants vs. Fen Ditton

Report by Daniel Mortlock:

Games like today's are why we need match reports. If this match had been played a couple of decades ago all that would be available is the one-line summary that Fen Ditton (135/3 in 20 overs) lost to Remnants (136/0) by 10 wickets. Someone reading this might reasonably assume that Remnants bowled and fielded well, restricting the Fen Ditton batsmen to a mediocre score, before two batsmen chased down the target with ease. What actually transpired was rather different. We pick up the action right from the start:

Saad Shoukat is to open the bowling for Remnants with a 6-3 off-side field in expectation of some outswing with the new ball. Everyone's in place . . . until the arrival of two left-handers means everyone's in the wrong place. Some wholesale - and not particularly coherent - field changes and we're ready to begin.

• 0.1 Shoukat to Hayward: Shoukat's first ball starts outside the left-hander's leg stump and if anything moves away. Lucky not to be called a wide and wicket-keeper Marcus Baker does well to take it. 0/0.
• 0.2 Shoukat to Hayward: This ball's even further down leg-side, and again Baker does well to stop it going for byes - and it would have been byes, not wides, as again the umpire remains unmoved. The same cannot be said for the batsman who looks back up the pitch in disbelief. The Remnants captain has a word with the umpire to say that deliveries this wide are definitely outside the implicit covenenant between the two teams and should be called (somewhat ironic given that the previous encounter between Remnants took on Fen Ditton was characterised and eventually decided by some absurdly over-zealous wide calls). 0/0.
• 0.3 Shoukat to Hayward: A repeat of the first two deliveries, this time not only called as a wide, but so far down leg that it also beats Baker. It looks like it might go for four, but Naveen Chouksey at fine leg makes a spectacular stop, successfully avoiding the trap of making a merely good stop by opting to use his foot to halt the progress of the ball. 2/0.
• 0.3 Shoukat to Woodward: Outside off finally, but too short and Woodward plays a sort of ramped late cut and the ball beats third man Claude Warnick and races to the boundary. 6/0.
• 0.4 Shoukat to Woodward: Good ball that's cut straight to point, but no run. 6/0.
• 0.5 Shoukat to Woodward: Another short ball and another late cut. Even though Warnick is now on the fence at third man he can't cut the ball off. 10/0.
• 0.6 Shoukat to Woodward: Sharp delivery that cramps the batsman for room and he defends awkwardly. 10/0.

At the other end Naveen Chouksey (1/15) is much more comfortable - it makes sense that a left-hander doesn't mind bowling to them - although some clever tip-and-run batting means that 5 runs come off this over. Given that one of those was a bye which yorked Marcus, the overall sense is that this just isn't going to be our day. Daniel Mortlock comes onto replace Saad and gets the ball on line, conceding just 2 runs from his first over and giving him "see, that's how it's done" bragging rights . . . until he too starts sending the ball down the leg-side in his second over, inducing a wide call that he effectively requested himself. The next few overs were similarly anarchic as we had repeated bowling changes, endless attempts to get the right field, and generally gave a sense of being an eleven-man rabble who weren't previously aware that it was possible to bat left-handed.

We did finally make a breakthrough when John Young caught a full-blooded pull shot off the bowling of Alec Armstrong (1/38). The arrival of a right-handed number three didn't help as much as we might have hoped, as the unusual difficulty of bowling to two left-handers was now replaced with the more common, but still evidently insurmountable challenge of having to change line and fielding positions every time a single was run (which seemed to be off most balls). After 16 overs Fen Ditton were 127/1 and a surely winning total of 160-170 was on the cards.

But then we got a vital update from the scorers: the surviving opener, Andy Hayward, was on 49, so could at most hope to hit one more boundary before retiring. That (combined with the expectation that it would be right-handers from now on) gave us the chance to bring Saad back on, and suddenly the character of the game changed completely:

• Over 17: A fired-up Saad, convinced he was being punished by not getting the ball earlier than this, demonstrates his resolve by . . . starting with a wide (albeit this time to a right-hander). But after that he's back to bowling with the pace and movement that has seen him comfortably topping our bowling averages this year, and the only other runs he concedes off the over is a two by Hayward that takes him to retirement. 131/1.
• Over 18: Daniel comes on for his final over in an attempt to curb the free-scoring of Fen Ditton's number three, George Silcock, on 36* off 22 balls at this point. Implausibly, it's a maiden over, and Fen Ditton really have ground to a halt. 131/1.
• Over 19: Saad's radar has now been fully recalibrated (or maybe it's just that the old settings are now correct) and he concedes just 3 runs while also taking a wicket, leaving him with figures of 1/16 off his 3 overs, scarecely believeable given what had happened an hour earlier. 134/2.
• Over 20: Naveen comes back to finish off the innings and bowls even better against the right-handers than he did against the lefties. Not only does he concde just one run, but he also gets a well-deserved wicket when Kaustav Dutta takes a weird reverse-cupped-hands catch at mid-off. 135/3.

Not only had we restricted Fen Ditton to a manageable total, but we also had all the momentum, having restricted them to just 8 runs from the final 4 overs of their innings. That meant we were able to send out our openers, Kaustav Dutta and Richard Rex, with clear instructions to play themselves in, and see out any threatening bowlers if scoring shots would be risky.

Kaustav and Richard implemented this strategy beautifully, although they didn't even have to worry about the second clause of their instructions as it soon became clear that Fen Ditton didn't have any threatening bowlers today. The situation was perhaps summed up by the first ball of the innings, which was a wild beamer that reached Kaustav at neck height. That's not to say it was easy to score, as a general lack of pace and low bounce made it difficult for the batsmen swing freely. Indeed, the most common shot throughout the innings was a flat sweep along the ground to deep square leg for a single, something we saw so often it was like deja vu when it happened again and again. In this manner Kaustav and Richard calmly scored at around a run a ball, building an excellent foundation . . .

. . . which, it soon dawned on those of us watching, was rapidly becoming the whole building. Kaustav calmly proceeded to retirement (on 50* off 44 balls), after which Marcus Baker (15* off 14 balls) came in to apply the final licks of paint, leaving Richard as site supervisor on 47* off 57 balls. We thus completed our 16th ten-wicket win, although possibly the only one to which three batsmen contributed. Of course the downside of all such results is that it means some players miss out on the chance to contribute, and this evening John and Claude had to take one for the team, Claude managing a full "TFC". From the team perspective it was not only a great come-from-behind victory, but the first time this year we've won two in a row.