Cor! Stuffing. 2s Mauled by Lions.

Another sterling effort by the selectors had just about scraped together 11 for the game against high-flying RH Corstorphine 2nds. But at 1pm there were only ten Crossers present. Who was missing?

Not Bainbro, who had driven back from Manchester, powered by Red Bull and indignation over the Old Trafford authorities' squeamishness over a damp patch in the outfield. (It wouldn't happen at Arbo - the squeamishness, that is, rather than the damp patch). Nor any of the drivers who had been forced by the foodie gathering in Inverleith Park to dump their cars so far from the ground that frankly they might as well have left them at the Lions' HQ in Barnton. No. It was Willie Lytle, marooned on Inchcolm island in the middle of the Forth by a late-returning boat - easily the best Cross excuse since Norrie was "detained" for the trip to Prestonpans two years ago.

I'm labouring all this introductory stuff because, sadly, an account of the game itself has little to offer the average Cross-fanatic reader of this blog. We lost too many early wickets to over-ambitious attack against disciplined bowling on a wicket that occasionally offered surprising bounce and so found ourselves 48 for 4 and 67 for 5 before rallying to 159 for 8. The rally was almost entirely down to an entertaining stand of 60 between Quinny (46) and Vik (29) who showed the application the top order, with the partial exception of BAF, hadn't. Vik's knock finished 4-4-4-out and finally messed up Gibson's otherwise excellent figures of 8-1-40-4. How Abid (9-4-13-0) didn't take a wicket or three is anyone's guess and West (9-5-14-1) and Dutia (9-2-36-2) offered excellent support for the openers with nagging accuracy and flighted leg-spin respectively.

We had an early breakthrough as BAF pulled off another run-out (rather less slow-mo than the one against Watsonians) to dismiss the dangerous Sathiy. Praveen (7-2-22-0) and Bainbro (9-2-32-0) produced tight and threatening opening spells. But then it all went downhill fairly quickly as Gus Hoffman (113 no) took charge. JB, who was bowling like a drain (straight and full of sh*t), suffered the most as Hoffman peppered the short legside boundary. A Corstorphine win by 8 wickets with 14 overs to spare was a fair reflection of the gulf - they should do very well next year in Division 3.