Report by Daniel Mortlock:

With the forecast finally decent - or at least not awful - the last thing we wanted on the back of May's washouts was another cancellation . . . and so of course on Monday the dreaded e-mail arrived for the PwC organiser: "A lot of dropouts over the last week or so. We are currently down to 3."

Yawn.

But, mere minutes after posting a desperate message on the WhatsApp group asking for alternative opposition, NCI once again came to the rescue and so we all headed off to King's College's playing fields on Barton Road . . .

Report by Daniel Mortlock:

. . . which was not as simple as it seems. Despite both maps and descriptive directions being provided via multiple media, there was a flurry of pre-match messages along the lines of "I can see the ground but the entry points are all closed." and "I'm on the other ground - walking over." We were at least sufficiently quorate that it was possible to have a proper toss, which we won . . . which was unfortunate: the pitch looked a bit soft and grassy, so not easy to bat on; but it was cloudy enough to think batting wouldn't be easier later in the day. In the end we heeded W.G. Grace's advice that "When you win the toss, bat; if you are in doubt, think about it, then bat." (Marooned way out in the middle of the giant ground there was no option to, in the case of "big doubts", "consult a colleague, then bat.")

That we quickly slumped to 42/4 might seem like batting first had been a bad call, but in fact the wickets were largely of our own making, as our top order opted for the ill-advised policy of hitting a bad ball to the boundary and then immediately getting out to the even worse follow-up trying to repeat the punishment. Of the dismissed top order batters only Saurav Dutta (15 off 11 balls) made it to double figuers; although none of the lower order were able to go past this, debut player Shikah Asthana (10 off 17 balls) and Max Ayliffe (11 off 19 balls) going closest. This might make it sound like it just wasn't going to be Remnants' day - perhaps a cosmic renormalisation following the "can do no wrong" fantasy we enjoyed when we last played this opposition a few weeks ago - but that would be to ignore the efforts of Quentin Harmer . . . who, playing for NCI (who hadn't been able to assemble a full team), instigated the second collapse of our innings. Shikah could perhaps be excused for the inevitable "bowled while playing across the line" dismissal; Rahul Jhawar (0 off 2 balls) was thus sent out with detailed warnings about what not to do, but did it anyway; and then Pete Ames (2 off 3 balls) also perished in the much the same fashion, despite having seen this plenty of times before. Quentin's final figures of 3/14 were comfortably the best of the evening.

The other main NCI contribution during the innings came from JP Joubert - who was, thankfully, playing for us. While he watched his partner after partner getting caught off mis-timed swipes, he essayed a far more traditional approach, based on a big stride forward and a straight bat. Just how difficult it was to get properly "in" on this pitch was evidenced by the fact that JP didn't score a boundary until his 27th ball; but the reward for his self-discipline was that he was then able to hit 4 more, before being forced to retire on 50* off 43 balls. Without his efforts we would have been completely stuffed; with them we were . . . well, only probably stuffed, with an almost acceptable total of 114/9.

With NCI requiring less than a run a ball we were going to need a near-perfect effort in the field - just one really expensive bad over would probably be enough to end ouf hopes - and we at least got off to a near-perfect start as Max Ayliffe (1/10) and Daniel Mortlock (1/19) conceded just 13 runs from the first 5 (six-ball) overs. We then got an enjoyable double-act from Saurav Dutta (1/17) and Pete Ames (1/26) both with their largely successful wrist-spinners - the NCI batters punished them decisively when they dropped short - and in the field, where they combined for the clear comedy moment of the day. After a well-hit drive off Pete was intercepted by Saurav at mid-on, who'd met the ball so sharply that what had seemed like a plausible quick single had been rendered suicidal; Pete positioned himself over the stumps, collected Saurav's throw, after which there was the satisfying "donk" of the ball connecting with the stumps while the batter was still well short of his ground . . . but Pete was too gentle, and while the bails visibly lifted up a little, they fell back into place, and the batter had made his ground by the time Pete reaslised he needed to repeat the procedure.

By this stage NCI were starting to score a bit more freely, with Teddy Brookes looking particular dangerous: after getting a feel for the wicket he'd then hit 4 . 2 3 4 4 1 and was now feeling so confident that it was time to bring out the reverse sweep against Pete. He made a solid connection, the ball flying fast and straight . . . into the hands of Chandan Brar at point, who completed a tricky catch. This was probably the critical moment of the game, as a few more overs of that sort of scoring would have been enough to tip the balance irreversibly in NCI's favour. And even with Teddy gone, they managed to stay in touch: 42/3 after 11 overs might have sounded disastrous in a T/20 game, but our low total meant the requirement was a clearly still-possible 73 needed from 54 balls. Any fantasies we had of killing off the game and sharing around the bowling were repeatedly dashed as the NCI batters put away the bad balls and scampered lots of twos. At the end of the 18th over they were on 97/4 and still in touch, with 18 needed off 12 balls (and the confidence of having hit 24 runs from the previous 12 balls). The usual "share the bowling around" policy was hence shelved, and the ball thrown back to Max, who conceded just 4 runs, as well as getting the key wickets of the left-handed Fielden, who was well caught by wicket-keeper Rahul Jhawar. That meant that even a pretty average final over from Daniel wasn't an issue, and we ended up winning a see-sawing game by 7 runs. (The NCI skipper generously said it was one of the best evening matches he'd played in - and thanks again to him and his club for getting the game in.)