The final game of the season & the few days before the game were filled with drama. Thursday evening & we have 6 players, plus Goochie will help out & so will Pooky with his arm in a cast. Move forward to Friday evening & we've got 11 players, including bowlers & batsmen!!!
Saturday lunchtime, we arrive at the picturesque village setting of Basildon. The beautiful clubhouse is a perfect setting for cricket. John does the decent thing, wins the toss & fields.
Pete &, the only-just-arrived, Jamie open the bowling & Basildon are restricted in their scoring due to accurate bowling. Jamie removes the opener, who hits the ball straight to Pooky's one good arm & he takes the catch. When Pete & Jamie come off, Basildon have raised the run rate & are batting well. Banny, following a few balls trying to find his length, pitches one that beats the bat & we have 2 wickets. Owen is bowling economically from the other end to Harry & we get to drinks with Basildon 2 wickets down, score about 90.
After drinks Pooky comes on & beats the bat regularly. The pressure starts to tell & Basildon give a couple of chances, but are not losing wickets. Owen gets an LBW followed by a caught behind off the gloves & finishes his economical spell.
John comes on to bowl, not thinking about the game, but that he needs 3 wickets to overtake Joe to regain the bowling cap. A stumping & an LBW are both turned down. But, Jamie takes a good catch. Soon after John gets a bowled, next ball an LBW. A quick cameo by one Basildon batsman is ended with being bowled. Basildon are not looking like getting to the score they want & the 3s are on top. Pooky gets the Basildon captain out, a good catch by Jon. Jamie came back on & took the final wicket, a good catch by the other Jamie.
Tea, BYO, Basildon 156-10, we are in the game & fancy our chances.
Nick & Jacob open up & Basildon bowl well, 2 young bowlers bowling accurately. Before too long Nick, Jamie & Jon have all fallen &, as usal, we are in trouble. Jacob & Owen then start to settle things down & put on a quick 30 before Owen falls. John, Banny & Jamie all do something not too dissimilar & by drinks we are 95-7, well ahead of the run rate, but have lost too many wickets. Jacob & the one-armed, newly left-handed Pooky are at the crease. We need 3 per over for 20 overs.
Pooky defends well & gets the odd single. Jacob continues as he has done for the season by defending well & hitting the bad balls. Pooky gets us to 104 before succcuming to a catch. Pete went in & came out quickly. We are 9 wickets down, needing 50 to win, but the grandad & grandson combination of Goochie & Jacob are at the crease. Basildon think the game is theirs, as there's only this old bloke to get out. Little do they realise that he can still bat & can also hit a bad ball. We need 3 per over & we are getting 3 per over. Basildon are feeling a bit frustrated, as Goochie won't play ball & get out. The grandad/grandson mix continues positively & we need 30 to win, then 20 to win, then 15 to win. Basildon are worried & the 3s cannot believe that we have got this close to victory.
In the 34th over, Goochie cannot keep the ball down enough & he is caught out. The 3s fall just 9 balls short. Goochie displayed an brilliant performance, almost getting us home. Jacob finished up carrying his bat for 68 not out , demonstrating his potential for higher teams in future seasons.
We have done enough to stay in Division 9, so we are happy. But, we came close to beating the top 3 teams in the division, more than once.
Well done to all who have played for the 3s this year, everyone has performed well at some point & we can look forward to next season with confidence.
