Strollers in the pink with first win
posted: June 28, 2012

The relief was palpable. After 5 days of relatively dry weather and a little joke from God in the form of a brief rain shower just before kick off, the covers came off and the cricket season was finally underway again.

Sturm won the toss and elected to bat. The Strollers were looking for a big score, being wary of the previous 20/20 against the Irregulars in 2011 when they chased down a solid looking score of 148 for the loss of just one wicket and two overs to spare. Gav and Graeme got things off to a flier with the run rate at 8 an over after 5 overs, both players smashing fours all around the boundary and Gav delighting the fans (i.e. Spencer's Gran) with a beautifully struck straight 6. Progress was unexpectedly helped when Gav pulled a hamstring and required a runner with first Sturm and then Tom coming on to race between the wickets on Gav's behalf like a couple of hares in place of a tortoise — an incongruity which was duly noted by the Irregulars but accepted with good grace (why didn't we think of this years ago?! — Ed).

Gav continued to bat well and second top-scored with 32, but there was a bit of a collapse as Graeme and then Tom fell in consecutive balls, with Sturm, Matt and then Gav following shortly thereafter as the Irregulars brought on the rather good Sami, who was searing in curve balls at a rate of knots, while the run-rate also slowed. However Rees and Spencer and then Rob Archdale settled things down with some solid, and in Spencer's case at least, graceful and at times sublime batting. Archdale, skipper of the Bohemians and helpfully filling in for the Strollers, was perhaps somewhat less graceful and sublime but nonetheless effective and entertaining as he slogged and swatted his way to a very useful 17 not out. Spencer was on top form, firing from the go with boundaries in all directions and the scoring rate picked up considerably, helped by a fair number of wides in the later overs, with the Strollers finishing on 144 off the 20 overs with Spencer on 40 not out.

Fortunately, this time round the Strollers were able to fend off the Irregulars' charge at a 140+ scoreline. This was down to some very strong bowling from all of the bowlers and a pretty good fielding performance. Graeme and Bowstead kept things tight to start with and the run rate was kept very low, Graeme finishing his four overs for a hugely impressive 2 for 10. Archdale came on and took a wicket with his familiar and mysterious slow left armers; as Graeme said "1000 wickets for the Bohemians and 1 for Strollers". Rob took a further wicket and then with Spencer and Tom bowling a tight line and length it was difficult for the batsmen to get the ball away, Tom conceding a miserly 6 runs off three overs. For the Irregulars, Giles Elwes batted admirably for his 59 not out, taking his time and then unleashing a cluster of aggressive shots in an occasional over here and there. For the Strollers the fielding was mostly good, with catches taken by Bowstead and Rees and some excellent saves on the boundary.

Unfortunately for the Irregulars they were quite a way off the pace and finished up 40 runs short of the target. While it's probably fair to say that this was a slightly weaker batting line-up than the Irregulars sometimes turn out, it was a good all round performance from the Strollers with all players contributing something positive to the match.

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