Inch Parky. Frozen 2nds Win at Edinburgh South Pole.

There must be nice days at Inch Park. I dimly remember warm, sunny evening games on the old square there fifteen or so years ago (although I also remember, rather less dimly, swarms of midges). There are some nice trees and a grand view of Arthur's Seat. But of late the 2nds only ever seem to go there right at the start of the season and in late April, early May Edinburgh South's HQ is a bleak, damp, windswept place.

We only had 10 but at the toss South only had 8. With South opting to put us in, Gerry immediately announced that he was off somewhere warmer needed to visit a friend - "Call me if you need me. Don't need me." BAF and Shifty opened up but, despite South's fielder shortage, runs were hard to come by - the pitch seemed hard but was quite dead; the outfield was slow; and skipper Irving (9-1-45-3), ex-Village-Person Adam Smith (9-0-37-0) and Varshney (9-1-32-2) all bowled tight opening spells. At 35-2 and with the South ranks slowly reaching the full eleven we weren't that well placed. But JB (84) and Ziggy (38) dug in for a 101 run partnership (including 5 penalty runs when a fielder landed his throw on his own cast-off sweater) and then Smudger (20 no) and Elmo (28 no) put on a rapid, unbeaten 52 for the last wicket. 215 for 6 looked like a winning score. Gerry, returning, declared that "For once the bloody batsmen have done their job."

There was tea. It was indoors. There was quite a lot of chocolate cake. Treble bliss. We lingered.

But joy was short-lived as any thoughts of a quick victory were thwarted by some obdurate South batting, increasingly frozen bowlers and, as it started drizzling after 6, an increasingly damp ball. De Silva set off at a fair lick before becoming the first of Elmo's two victims in a fine spell (9-3-23-2); Ross, who had turned up very late only after failing to get into a pub to celebrate Hearts' championship, played some attractive shots for his 26; and Goti (41 no) and Smith (19) did a very passable impression of our own Kapp-Smith partnership in adding 32 for the final wicket. 151 all out in 40 overs.

In general it wasn't the good balls that took the wickets and, just like last week at Arbo, the half-tracker-cum-double-bounce-yorker was the deadliest ball of all. Ten of the fifteen wickets to fall in the match were bowled. Dan (9-1-44-3) bowled a lot of good balls for his wickets and JB (6.2-1-24-3) bowled almost none for his.

Thanks to South for a game played in the usual excellent spirits despite the cold. We look forward to the return and pray earnestly that the weather will be better in July.