Fuds' Fielding is the Highlight of the Weekend of Woe!

[Andy G reports on the match between HX 3's & Glenrothes 3's]

The 3rd X trucked to Glens on Saturday morning full of beans and arrived early. Yes that's right, 9 of 10 arrived at 12.15!! Unheard of! So in order to not embarrass ourselves with any sort of warm up we hung out in the changing room until 1250 mostly chatting about how good England are and what would Dhoni do against Coco's pace?!

Naturally Mahmood rocked up at 5 to 1 ...and to the wrong car park.

We were told that we'd be playing on the big pitch! That would have been great!! Unfortunately, it was really wet after the night before - the groundsman had said it needed watered so didn't put the covers on overnight! We would have played if there was no alternative but thought it would be a much better game if we played on the arti!

We assembled the nets around the outfield (though this didn't help as we still lost 6 balls - don't worry Jon only 1 new one was lost!) and tossed up. I won the toss and decided to bat, mostly cause I was a bit tired after hockey pre-season fitness and didn't want to field until I'd had tea! It's the finer details that determines decisions of what way the captain will elect to start the game when he wins the toss...

So Mahmood and Mike kitted up and sauntered in! The first ball; Mike hits it straight to a fielder and shouts YES! in true Nevin style. Mahmood sprints 2 paces then falls over in the middle of the crease. The Glenrothes fielder launches the ball in and the wickety was haulted by their skipper from taking the bails, very sporting !! Mahmood reciprocated by not scoring a run off the next 19 balls he faced - good coastal erosion!

Nevin hit 3 and was bowled bringing the Parker to the crease. He had gone to his brother's for tea the night before so was full of good red wine and brandy - unfortunately this wasn't a winning combination! It needs to be rum before a cricket game Ross, you know that!!
Ross went to hit one and it went high - their skippa made up some  ground to take it at mid on!

So I pop in at the 16th over. I'd been scoring since the start and really needed a wazz but couldn't leave scoring cause i'd been next in since the 12th! I decided I just had to see off 4 overs before scuttling off behind a container!! After 19 overs we had 44 runs (only 14 off 4 with me and Mahmood so pretty slow!) Mahmood then gets bowled!! This brought in the powerhouse - Fraser Buchanan. We had drinks - and I excused myself - and this brought a lease of life to the Cross!

It also made the wicket keeper a bit chattier - after i'd scratched around a bit for the last 4 overs he was getting chirpier (asking if I knew that we were playing cricket? did I know I needed to try and hit the rope? Were we trying to get 70 to get 1 batting point? Did my shorts and sock combination come in white cause the blue looks a bit village?)

I enjoyed this chat ... A lot! It was really good - I had a chat with him after and said if he ever moved to Edinburgh he should come to the cross. I asked him if he would like to put someone on the rope at cow corner and he said that because I hadn't hit a shot past short mid on. So I gave Butchy the wink ...

We proceeded to smack the ball around all corners of the ground.
After the 20th over (having hit a 6 and 2 4s to cow / long mid on) I asked the wickey the same question- they then had 3 on that boundary! Butchy and I hit 90 off 9 overs before I played across a straight one and was bowled for 68! Disaster, I didn't think and was punished! Bit silly but I made it to 400 for the season, only 20 odd short of Ross last season so I'll take that!

Butchy shortly followed me back to the rope on 26 a good but short lived partnership!
Dom and Elmondt were in next. Dom 'the new Mike Nevin' McMonagle played technically well but couldn't get the ball off the square. He then calamitously ran Elmondt out ... He still thinks there was a run straight to a lad in the covers!

There was a little wagging of the tail with Andy Donaldson striking a good 6 and losing a ball. But we were done-168 all out! Not a terrible score but with that short boundary we probably needed more than 200.

Delicious tea - someone had clearly been watching the Bake Off as there was a rather delightful carrot cake sitting out! Scrumptious !

Elmondt and Dom opened the bowling. Both bowled really well, Elmondt cracked open the wickets with a chap trying to hit him and Butchy back peddling in to take it at short mid wicket! Unfortunately we didn't take any more early wickets and although we limited them to 35 off 16, it wasn't quite enough - Elmo went for 4 runs and Dom 31.

Ross, in his second over picked up a wicket! He bowled an absolute howler of a ball - so bad that he'd already turned his back so he didn't have to look at it go over the rope. But never fear bucket hands McGonagle had it covers a great diving catch on the boundary bundling himself forward to not allow it over the rope! Great catch - catch of the season for me!

This opened them up a little bit with Coco taking one at the other end. A shot from their no. 4 getting scooped high in the air, spinning like mad off the edge - only for Gareth Howlett to get himself in a really good position to take the catch! Really good catch again! Coco bowled another; the spin, pace and flight confused the young keeper!
The last wicket we took was from Andy Donaldson -again another of these catch things! Elmondt at deep mid off! Excellent catching display; 4 of 4 taken on the day!

Although it was too little. They dispatched our short deliveries for 4s and 6s with one chap making 97*. If we had one more player either a bat to score 30 more runs or a bowler to get a couple more tight overs then we would have had a bit more of a chance.
A really commendable effort from the troops, everyone contributed with either a run, a catch or a wicket! Couldn't ask for much more against the league champs.

So it's not in our hands to go up any more but I tell you something selection's looking rosy for Saturday and our match away to Largo!!