ANZACs at GHCC
Heady days indeed. Two games into the
season and the Anzacs have already
equaled their total number of wins from last season. The game had all the
ingredients that are typical of an Anzacs game, starting with the
traditional car turning up late because an exit was missed. Ah yes, the GPS
is no match for natural stupidity. With the umpires turning up late as well,
the game didn’t start till 11:30. Parth (Skunk) won the toss – a feat he
will be hard pressed to emulate through the remainder of the season, and
elected to bat first on a wicket which wasn’t expected to bounce much. Of
course, that was only true of full tosses, as we were to discover later.
Shekhar and Skunk opened the batting for the Anzacs. Shekhar borrowed
Sudeep’s (Hal) bat and it was evident that the sweet spot on the bat had
miraculously tripled overnight. Skunk took on the bowling early on quite
successfully and once Shekhar joined the party with a few rasping drives of
his own, the Anzacs were off to a flier. Skunk fell at the end of the fifth
over in typical fashion (look at me, I’m going to hit a six..…oh f***). But
Shekhar showed greater application and by the 10th over the score had moved
on to 66 for the loss of 1 wicket.
The next few overs weren’t as good as the Anzacs middle order collapsed as
is tradition. Ketan (Latts) played all over a full one and that brought Hal
in at 2 down. As Shekhar was using the good bat, Hal had to borrow Nagi’s
(Cobra) bat which clearly had no sweet spot at all, especially around the
edges. Long story short, an edge looped to mid off and we were 3 wickets
down. The next wicket belonged to the umpire as Rahul was given out - we’re
still not sure for what, but the scorecard says LBW for some reason. Jeff
(Brown) left the very next ball well alone, not realizing he would be out if
it hit the stumps, and just like that the Anzacs’ cultural diversity came to
an end.
Sunil (Zero) and Shekhar brought some sanity back into the proceedings with
a brief stand of 21. Then against the run of play, Shekhar set off for a run
without actually hitting the ball (at least that’s what it looked like) and
was stumped for an extremely well compiled 39. Kam (The Mouth) had to pause
his sledging for a while (3 balls, to be precise) and once given out
controversially LBW, had to be pushed down and rolled out of the ground.
Bakul didn’t last much longer and the Anzacs were on the ropes at 97 for 8.
The ‘duck bench’ was beginning to get really heavy, but that was mostly
because The Mouth was sitting on it.
Enter Anirudh (Tack), who was warned to either perform or be kicked in the
unmentionables by his wife. Such a threat is guaranteed to make even the
bravest shake at the knees, and it inspired Tack to play a tremendous
innings under pressure. Tack and Zero played with great maturity, first
silencing the Greenville bench and then igniting the Anzacs bench (which
also included the Greenville bench) as they built a partnership. The Anzacs
bench was asked politely to quiet down; a request that was rather impolitely
declined. If Greenville thought they had the innings wrapped up, these two
gentlemen had other ideas as they hardly put a foot wrong through the rest
of the innings. It looked like we would be lucky to get to 120 at one stage,
but with these two motoring along nicely, 150 seemed a distinct possibility.
Somebody forgot to tell them though, and a brutal assault towards the end
lifted the Anzacs to an unlikely total of 180. 41 runs came off the last 3
overs and in all the partnership for the 9th wicket was unbroken at 83. Zero
finished with 35, and Tack with 44. An amazing turn around of fortunes and
even the helmet on the bench celebrated with us. That’s when we realized
that Cobra was underneath it.
The Anzacs bowling strategy had revolved around a pitch that wasn’t expected
to bounce much. Greenville’s bowlers had showed us quite graciously that
that wasn’t the case. We ungraciously unleashed Skunk and Rahul on them.
Opener Satta did an unwise thing and dispatched the first ball of the
innings to the boundary. Two balls later Skunk bowled him neck and crop.
Some two seconds or so later, Satta tried to play at the ball. The
Greenville batsmen seemed to think they needed a bat. Quite unnecessary
really, if you aren’t going to use it at all. After repeatedly beating the
bat, Rahul got the all important wicket of Vaibhav by bouncing him out. Next
batsman in was Mustafa, who not only didn’t need a bat, he really shouldn’t
have even woken up that morning. Actually, the way he batted suggested that
he hadn’t in fact woken up.
After Skunk and Rahul woke up the batsmen with their first spell, Tack and
Latts came on next and kept the screws on. Tack continued his fine game with
a beauty that got rid of Rafay. A wasted delivery really that should have
been saved for….say…a batsman. Mustafa’s misery ended soon enough after The
Mouth, who was watching the batsman’s feet instead of the ball, pointed out
that he was lifting it a couple of seconds after playing the ball. Sure
enough the formality was completed and he was stumped off Latts. The Anzacs
were in a race against time as the threat of rain was very real and Zero was
brought into the attack to hurry the bowing rate along. He wanted to take
wickets instead, the selfish bastard. Along with Latts, he ran through the
Greenville middle order, helped by some tremendous fielding and catching by
the fielders who were clearly having an off day. Skunk pulled off a stunner
at point and Latts pouched an even more stunning one over his head. The rain
was getting closer and a tremendous crash of thunder got us all worried.
False alarm though, as that was merely The Mouth diving forward to take a
catch
At 54 for 8, the Anzacs were staring at a really large win. But the attempt
to rush through the overs threw the bowlers off their comfort zone and good
hitting by Faraz got Greenville to a total of 112. Rahul finally got Faraz
to hole out to Brown at long on and the Anzacs’ cultural diversity came
roaring back to life. Latts and Zero were the pick of the bowlers with
figures of 6-0-20-3 and 6-2-16-3 respectively. Rahul made an impressive
debut with figures of 4-1-17-2. For their starring roles, Tack and Zero were
declared men of the match and Latts picked up the other point.
All in all a very convincing and much needed victory. The team looked
completely different and it just goes to show what a few practice sessions
can do. Next game is on May 14th against BCC. Let’s keep the momentum
rolling and make this a season to remember. Go Anzacs!
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