Yet again it seems that I am the last to post my blog and yet again it will mean I go to sleep late and wake up at a silly hour tomorrow morning. Fortunately, my excuse is perfectly valid, for I have been busy all afternoon and if I had blogged at lunch time then the entire post would have been no longer than this first paragraph!
Yes folks...this morning was, once again, pretty much a write-off, as after dragging myself out of bed, having breakfast, surfing the net for a while and then indulging in a shower, it was almost lunch time. The only real event of note was Phil coming to collect Lydia for a driving lesson and only being allowed in by virtue of me noticing a shadowy figure standing outside the porch. We really must get that doorbell fixed!
I waited for Lydia to come home before having lunch, and walked round Tesco to get some 'supplementary' food as the contents of the larder were largely inedible. After we had eaten Lydia agreed to accompany me to town in order to purchase tickets for us two and Ernest to watch the Saints v Ajax friendly at St Mary's on Saturday. This meant battling our way through the city traffic in Jalopy and, although I knew roughly where I was going, being unfamiliar with the area (ie which lane to be in and when) made the journey a bit more of an adventure!
Upon arriving at the stadium we found parking tricky as the signs seemed to contradict eachother - 'pass holders only - clamping fine £25' placed next to 'visitors and megastore customers only' - very confusing! In the end I left Lydia with the car to tell a sweet story of innocence if necessary and walked round to the box office to collect the tickets. Fortunately, as all of us are classed as 'young adults', I manged to get them for the bargain price of £5 each, which is excellent value considering Ajax are a regular champions league side (admittedly they are likely to tonk Saints but that's a story for Saturday).
Thankfully Lydia and Jalopy had not been seized and, after briefy getting lost due to the one-way system, we successfuly navigated our way onto the familliar road home. Lydia wanted to stop in Hythe so we diverted through Marchwood and once L had made her purchase we bought yet more ice creams to eat on the sunny promenade, which made for an excellent half-hour restbite.
We arrived home with not much time to spare before I had to go to church cricket, so I set up some stumps in the garden and did some bowling practice for around 20 minutes in order to get warmed up. Dad was held up with work and, after getting back late, had to make a quick turnaround for us to be at Paultons cricket ground for the 6.15 start.
The ground is very picturesque, with the only downside being its location - right beside a junction of the M27, with traffic noise a constant presence. Fortunately we were blessed with excellent weather and a good number of friends from church had turned out to support the team.
Gareth lost the toss meaning that we ended up fielding first for the fourth match in a row, with me alternating mainly between the square leg and mid-off positions. I bowled in the 10th and 12th overs and was lucky enough to grab my second wicket of the season, the batsman edging his shot into the hands of wicket keeper James. However, I didn't have it all my own way as the next man in tonked a couple of sixes and I finished with figures of 1-20. Dad also got a wicket, clean bowling his man towards the end of the innings. Overall the fielding was pretty good, with only a few loose balls letting us down. A disappointment was the disruption to the flow of play caused by balls landing in bushes which could then not be found, and as Paultons hit quite a lot of boundaries, this caused a problem on a number of occasions. They finished on 154-5, leaving us chasing (yet again) a large but not entirely unachievable target.
I was put in at no.7 and, with St Andrew's making a strong start, I sat on the sidelines chatting to Sam and Simmo, suspecting that my tonking 'talent' may again be surplus to requirements. However, after the departure of the two openers, wickets tumbled fairly quickly and I found myself in bat alongside Dad with four overs remaining. The very first ball I faced took a huge bounce and I somehow manged to knock it away for 4, despite the real intention being to maintain the current shape of my nose! With a high run rate required, Dad was understandably keen to stay on strike and hit three sixes in succession. I added a few more runs to my tally, but knowing that much more was required, I took a final over swish at the ball, which turned, the bat missed and that was me out for 8. A few balls later Dad suffered a similar fate and we finished on 140-7...a 14-run defeat. Again we had come so near, yet so far, but the team had once more done itself proud against 'proper' cricketing opposition.
A post-match drink was in order (though two cokes may have been a little excessive), after which Dad made like we were heading for home, but in fact spent quite some time phoning round the Bramshaw side trying to patch up his team for Saturday!
We finally made it back by around 10 and found Ern and Lydia, fresh from table tennis escapades, watching a 'Becoming Jane'. I joined in the viewing and also aided them in the consumption of tooty frooties and yet more popcorn. Dad also stuck some highly nutritious potato wedges in the oven to top it all off! The film proved too long to finish in one sitting so we shall continue tomorrow evening after me and Ern have played golf.
After all that I think my current state of tiredness can be justified so I shall draw this glorified match report to a close. Farewell, friends!
J.E.D.I JULY!!!
16 years ago
No comments:
Post a Comment