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Tuesday 15 June 2010

Bobby and Matty with the Ball, Bobby and Mark with the Bat seal MCC win

  • v Princes Head Pub
  • Sunday 13th June
  • Sheen Park
  • MCC won by 7 wickets
Dusty Tooves reports (it has been reviewed for bad language)
Maladroits hosted the unknown quantity of The Kings Head Pub from Richmond on what is fast becoming known as 'Fortress Sheen' (at least, it will be until the match report on last week's loss to the Drovers is uploaded) on a Sunday where English optimism had dipped to the traditional post-world-cup-opener low. Boozer, ever the believer, elected to bowl first and looked to Tricky to conjure up a miracle. He provided one immediately by sending down a maiden via the crafty technique of utilising the corridor of uncertainty... that being the channel between the batsmen's pads and the leg side popping crease in which a hungover umpire doesn't want to set a dangerous precedent in calling wide. A second miracle was conjured when Tricky picked up the opening wicket with a rank longhop to set the Droits on a merry dance through the opposition batting lineup. An Asian player with a genuine accent is enough to send the 'imported superstar' chills down the spine. And after several balls were marmalised to various parts of the ground, it was with great relief that Matty induced an outside edge to first slip that Mark swallowed up with the eagerness that a hungry tramp snaps up the sandwiches that PrĂȘt discards at the end of each day. Matty snavvled one next ball, and with the hat-trick on, Boozer turned the pressure up by arranging most of his field into catching positions. Unfortunately one of those wasn't at deep mid off as the hat-trick ball was dispatched most of the way to Mortlake.
At the other end Dom had kept it tight, unlike the previous evening, and Glen - determined to get more than 2 overs this weekend - bowled with determination, speed, and controlled aggression. 2 overs later he was hauled off for Bobby 'Stump Rattler' Nelson to begin a spell of bowling so good that it bought raucous roars of approval every 90 seconds or so from the crowd. Either that it was the reverse thrusters on the engines of the 747's... both noises are eerily similar, yet a damn sight more tuneful than that of a plastic horn. Using the old adage of 'you miss, I hit' coupled with a new theory of distracting the batsmen with a (frankly) ridiculous choice of footwear, Bobby sent stumps and bails flying. At the opposite end of the carnage, Tooves shuffled his way in to give Bowden some more catching practice. Unfortunately Bowden wasn't made aware of this and shelled 2 chances before Dusty removed the Greg Davies lookalike with the last ball of his 2nd over. Boozer thought this was the ideal time to haul him off and bought on Crispin to clean up the tail. A generous offer to let 2 of the opposition batsmen bat again briefly looked like it was going to backfire until Bobby cleaned up the returning batsmen on his way to a well-deserved 4-for, leaving Maladroits 146 to chase.
Tea's were, yet again, of a high quality. So good that the recently acquired Antipodean contingent were heard worryingly murmuring about the setting of a dangerously high quality precedent. The lovingly home-made sandwiches, sausages, cake, scones, and the ever-popular Haribo combined to make a spread that surely not even the Delia-inspired Norwich City FC would be able to match. Next weeks opponents should bring a mini DV cam to film this all important part of proceedings, with a view as using as an instructional video.
With the insistence of a certain team members (ill-advised, in hindsight) eagerness to see a football match at 7:30pm that evening ringing in their ears, The Maladroits top-order pursued their target with the vigour and vim of a recently fed Crusader. Slashing through the unexpecting infidels were Mark Bowden, using his blade on a rampaging pillage through the oppositions bowlers, and the slightly more sedate Leesy, who took the more circumspect and sophisticated Bond-villain approach to the disposing of an opponent. Both posted commendable 50's, however Leesy's was the subject of some confusion after Boozer's new toy, the iphone cricket scoring app (Man of The Match in the reporters opinion) placed him 5 or 6 runs higher than the traditional pen and paper method. In fairness to the opposition, their best bowler took an early shower due to an unspecified injury, and surely sensing the fervour of Bowden, the skipper decided not to change any of the the bowlers for fear of him destroying their fragile confidence. Tricky finally managed to contribute in the field by letting through a couple of boundaries whilst fielding for the opposition, combining with some (very) brief cameo's from Ash, Tooves, and Glen that saw Maladroits salute the judges with a furlong to spare.
All in all a right royal stuffing that was done and dusted by the pleasing time of 5pm. There was barely a bad performance from within the playing group, with Bowden making up for shelling 3 catches by taking a sharp one and belting 65 off about 13 deliveries, Leesy hitting the winning runs to confirm his 50, Bobby taking 4 wickets and Matty chiming in with 3.

  • MOM: Bobby Nelson (4 wickets)
  • Fielder of the Day: Dom (few great stops and some world breaking stone drifting)
  • DOD: Tricky (for getting out of bed the wrong side- just wait till he's got two little ones)