Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Day 13: The Cricket Match


And what a cracking game of cricket we had here today!

The match was 35 overs per side – but with the possibility of a draw built into the rules. If either innings was not complete (either all-out, or beaten the score of the opposition), the game is to be declared a draw.

Yes, hopefully that should make sense to people who know cricket. If you don’t I’ll explain more as we go along.

At the bottom of the post there is a link to pictures of the full scorecard for the match, if you just want to jump straight in and see how it went – but reading the blog entry will provide much more excitement... it’ll be like being there watching the game. And believe me... it was a thriller!


Rest Of The World XI

Here we go...

The Rest Of The World batted first with Phil Clark and Xavier Halliwell opening the bowling. The RoW were in trouble from the outset, with Clark knocking over one of their openers in the first over. A good catch from Charlie Lowson, running backwards and taking the ball over his shoulder, gave Clark and Australia their second wicket. When Halliwell picked up an LBW in the next over, and wicket-keeper Trudgian claimed a skyed top edge in the over after that, the RoW were reeling at 4/15 after 5 overs.

This brought Dip Das and Owain Williams, captain of the RoW team, together, and the Australians struggled to make more progress. Das and Williams piled on the runs for the next 12 or so overs, plundering a partnership of over 100 runs. The Australians cycled through their bowling options, but without success.

It was only after a team huddle and some words of wisdom and inspiration from captain Halliwell that the breakthrough was made. Well, that, and bringing Clark back into the attack. Tim Trudgian took a sharp catch standing up to the stumps to dismiss Das, after he chased a ball wide outside off stump – a ball that the bowler himself described as “terrible”.

From there, the Australians got back on top – Clark took yet another wicket, making 5 for him before the drinks break at 20 overs. Even though he had to leave at that point to meet other commitments, the rest of the Aussie bowlers finished off the RoW tail-enders. Williams remained undefeated on 68 at the end of the innings, but ran out of partners – the last wicket falling in the 32nd over.

The RoW had made a good score of 161, but apart from Das and Williams, none of their players made double figures!


Australian XI - back: Charlie Lowson, Jesse Dore, Xavier Halliwell (c), Berian James, Owen Dive, Matt Penfold - front: Alex Grant, Will Usher, Tim Trudgian (wk), Chris Knowles, Albert Alla

The Australians went into bat, and it looked like being a carbon copy of the RoW innings. Wickets fell so quickly at the beginning of the innings that the batting order had to be changed around several times based on who happened to be ready to go! It was 2/1 after opening batsmen Berian James and Will Usher fell quickly. Tim Trudgian and Albert Alla looked to have things under control for a while but fell before either of them could reach double figures.

Just as with the RoW innings, the fifth wicket partnership was the highest of the innings. Halliwell and Matt Penfold combined to see off a good number of overs, although had no intentions of scoring at the same rate as Das and Williams had earlier in the day. Just before drinks, the partnership was broken when Halliwell miscued a pull shot and was adjudged LBW for 14 from 22 balls.

The sixth wicket held on for a while longer after drinks. It was clear at this point that Australia were playing for the draw. Penfold at one stage facing 20 consecutive dots balls... before breaking his streak by hammering the ball over backward square for the only 6 of the day.

By the time Penfold was dismissed for 16 he had faced 46 balls, and given the tail enders a chance at seeing off the rest of the overs to salvage a draw.

OK - a pause for those of you who need some explanation. The situation is that Australia were in a position where there was no way they were going to score as many runs as the RoW team. But, because the RoW lost all of their wickets when batting, if Australia did not lose all of their wickets before the end of the match, it would be a draw (Not a tie. A tie is where both teams make the same score. A draw is where the game is declared incomplete, and no one wins or loses)

Alex Grant fell soon after, Charlie Lowson lasted just 3 balls, and Jesse Dore (the first of 3 number-elevens in our side) only 2.

And so it was 9/76 with 8.5 overs remaining. Chris "Knowlesy" Knowles and Owen Dive were at the crease. The two guys who had each spent the last few days trying to convince the team management that they should be the number 11 batsman.

With paceman Gavin Sourgen now having bowled 2.1 overs with figures of 2-0 (he had cleaned bowled both Matt and Charlie), he decided to change it up and bowl some spin to this pair. Owen did himself proud, coming well forward to the first ball, and safely defending it away. A play and miss at his second ball – but importantly, not out. And so it went for 3 more deliveries, and Owen had seen off his over. The crowd loved it. But still 8 overs to go.

At the other end Knowles was doing himself equally proud. After spending the week talking up how terrible he was, he wielded the bat like he had all the experience in the world, seemingly having no trouble in seeing off deliveries from Das, who had now been brought into the attack.

Just as the Australians had used 10 bowlers, so the RoW now made more changes to the attack, including a change of wicket keeper to bring on their 9th and 10th bowlers. Dive and Knowles continued to see off deliveries. The RoW were powering through the overs, Darren Lehman style, and before anyone knew it, there were just 4 overs left in the match.

In the next over, Dive got an edge on a ball from Williams, which flew wide of first slip and away for a single. The crowd roared... but Dive himself roared louder, raising his bat in triumph as he got off the mark!

With 16 balls to go, Knowles had a swing... and successfully drove the ball down the ground through long-off... for 4! Tim Trudgian, who was out on the field doing the umpiring, reminded his team mate of the state of play: “Just 15 balls left in the match. Perhaps you should keep that in mind when making your shot selection.” Knowles justified the shot by explaining that he had no intention of finishing with 0 runs to his name.

And so it was back to defending. As the balls counted down, the field was brought in closer and closer, and for the final 2 overs, the RoW returned to two of their top-line bowlers. Spinner Singh came on for penultimate over. On several occasions Dive popped the ball into the air just to either side of the wicket... but on each occasion, it fell safely out of reach of a lunging fielder. Singh’s special change-up is the faster delivery. Late in the over, he tried a few of them out, leaving Dive playing (safely) at the ball after it was already in the ‘keepers gloves.

And then there were just 6 balls. Opening bowler Douglas steaming in to bowl to Knowles. He blocked. He played and missed. He was struck on the body... but they were unable to claim his wicket!

The Australians had held on... the final wicket partnership had seen off 53 balls, 2 scoring shots, 5 runs, but unbeaten. Immediately after the match, Dive announced his retirement from international cricket – perfectly happy with his career batting stats.

Dive and Knowles celebrate their 10th wicket heroics post-match


Scorecards are below...






4 comments:

  1. That's fantastic! Well done Owen!!

    --Mrs Berian

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  2. Nice draw boys - well done Owen!

    "Personally, I have always looked on cricket as organised loafing." - Archbishop William Temple

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  3. "A game so strange you would think it was invented by the Dutch!" - Andy Clark

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  4. No surprise Owen did so well with such a rich cricketing heritage, for the uninformed, research Molly Dive.

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