Keen to reverse the 2 game losing skid, the Anzacs took on the student team of NCSU this weekend at the NC State Lee fields. Given that it takes maturity and wisdom to grasp the subtleties and nuances of the fine game of cricket, it was understandable that the game featured an immature, brash and quite badly behaved team. NCSU on the other hand, were quite well behaved. This was also Hughie’s (Jorgen) swan song, after 8 years of dedicated service to the team. The team didn’t really need him this game though, and Jorgen was to play only a miniscule role in the ensuing win.
Parth (Skunk) has proven to be an able captain at the toss this season. He won yet another one and elected to field first. Jorgen and Rahul (Dog) started things off for the Anzacs. Jorgen immediately hit a good line and length, troubling the batsmen, while Dog started well, but proceeded to completely lose the plot in his second over. The first wicket fell yet again by virtue of a run out, with Skunk showing some of that arm strength and accuracy, and Krishna (Harry) showing the ability to catch such a throw rather than shying away in typical Anzac fashion. Tired of having to catch rifled throws from the field, Harry decided to take matters into his own hand and bowled the other opener neck and crop.
Skunk was unfortunate not to pick up a wicket first up as a clear edge was clearly not audible to the umpire and a confident appeal was turned down. The batsman in question would go on to top score for NC State with 37. The runs continued to come at 5 an over for the Pack despite wickets falling at regular intervals. Dog picked up a wicket in his second spell, but even that didn’t slow down the run rate any. The introduction of Nagi (Cobra) into the attack did the trick for the Anzacs. Getting the ball to curve, slither and spit, Cobra had the batsmen in all sorts of trouble from the get go. He picked up a couple of key wickets including that of the dangerous Abhishek and was distinctly unlucky not to pick up more as the keeper Sudeep (Hal) was equally mesmerized and put down a couple of stumpings.
Jorgen came on for his second spell and along with Cobra stemmed the flow of runs. The next wicket fell to the classic Jorgen slower one; the batsman completed the stroke and began the walk back to the pavilion before the ball even got to him! The next few batsmen had the best of intentions but the worst of prowess and a swish here, a waft there, and stumps were clattering all over the place as Skunk and Harry helped themselves to 2 wickets apiece at the death. Despite an irritating and fortuitous 9th wicket stand of 29, the Anzacs still restricted the total to 145, an eminently gettable score on the smallish ground. Cobra and Hugh were the pick of the bowlers with figures of 2/17 and 1/19 respectively off their 6 overs. Harry picked up 3 wickets and Skunk picked up 2.
The horrifying flicx pitch dictated that the batsmen get on the front foot early and play the ball on the up. In an intriguing demonstration of how NOT to play on the flicx, Shekhar didn’t seem interested in middling the ball at all in the early part of his innings and repeatedly played and missed at deliveries short of a length. Harry had no such issues and cracked a boundary and a resounding six early on. Shekhar woke up, realized he was playing on the flicx, and then started to play quite well. The opening stand put on 42 runs when Harry was unlucky to smash one in the air straight to point. Anirudh (Tack) and Shekhar continued to build on the early momentum, and by the last over before drinks the Anzacs had already reached half of the target. All that was required was to play the ball on the ground and pick up the singles, so Shekhar holed out to deep midwicket. He had made 28 with four boundaries.
That brought Tack and Cobra together, and just like that we had 13 NCSU players on the field. Tack wore an NC State cap to further confuse the NCSU fielders into thinking he was one of theirs. The Anzacs’ bench was certainly confused and on occasion found themselves rooting for the fielding side by mistake. The Anzacs were targeting 100 off 20 overs, but Tack and Cobra took the score to 94 within 17 overs. In an effort to slow down the scoring rate and thereby stick to the original game plan, Tack got himself out playing an ungainly stroke to be bowled for 25. That merely set the tone for what was to follow though, as Jorgen strode out to the middle for one final time. Cobra was on strike next over and batting side on, he was invisible to the umpire. The bowler did really well to actually hit this small a target and got the ball to brush his thigh pad. Since the umpire couldn’t actually see the batsman himself, he naturally assumed that the ball had hit the bat and the appeal for caught behind was upheld. An understandable mistake, and it’s just too bad for us that the batsman on strike when we appealed for a dismissal was a fat bastard, or the same logic would have been employed.
While Jorgen was batting quite beautifully at one end, the same cannot be said of the goings on at the other end, where one ugly batsman after another kept getting out…..in an ugly fashion. Dog had a brain fart, decided to hit himself out of trouble, and was trapped in front. Skunk had a brain-less fart and holed out to mid on. Jeff (Brown) was clearly rattled by the presence of a second white boy on the team, let alone in the middle, and his prejudices got the better of him as the stumps went cartwheeling. Shaluka (Chuck) attempted a great shot, only to miss the ball completely and we had more stump cart wheeling madness.
The Anzacs had slid in spectacular fashion from 94/2 to 136/8 and Jorgen was left wondering if he would have any support at all. Hal walked in determined to give Jorgen as much of the strike as possible and proceeded to hog most of the strike without scoring anything. A boundary through the covers eased the pressure considerably and Jorgen calmly knocked off the remaining runs off the next over, fittingly bringing up the winning runs with a boundary. Jorgen ended up unbeaten on 36 off just 20 balls with 6 hits to the fence. For his efforts with the bat and ball, Jorgen was declared man of the match, picked up 3 useless points, and got to take home a terrible, used MACC ball that was further mutilated by the signatures of all the players. It might still be good for gully cricket, but probably not worth the space in the suitcase.
All in all, a great team (Jorgen) effort. Harry was awarded 2 points for his 3 wickets and 17 runs while Cobra picked up 1 point for his 2 wickets and invisibility. A game that should have been won comfortably ended up being a dogfight (no reference to Rahul). But a win’s a win and we’ve already doubled the number of our wins from last season. This also means we remain firmly in the hunt for a playoff berth. The Anzacs now enjoy a 3-week break from MACC cricket before hitting the grueling months of July and August.
Good-bye Jorgen. We’ll miss you. You made sure of that!