Regulation throat swabbing complete, WOCC were in fine spirits ahead of their 30 over a side friendly with a motley crew from Heritage and TCS. Luxembourg had delivered a glorious day and skipper Reinhardt did well to lose the toss so that the WOCCers could bat first.
Despite his impressive bat speed, WOCC lost Akhilesh early after he missed a straight one from Vishwajeet. Vishy bowled 6 tidy overs, keeping Thomas and Ed Packard honest in the power-play and eventually returning figures of 1 for 20. After Thomas fell trying to release some pressure, Ed and Gaurav pushed the score on to 69 before Ed nicked one behind off Naveen. Gaurav’s winter spent in the gym was paying off and together with the skipper they started to dispatch the ball to all parts. Reiny was particularly ruthless on any hint of width as he raced to 57 off 36 balls.
Fed up with watching his team mates go the distance, oppo captain Sri took off his keeping pads and had a bowl. This is the sort of maverick captaincy we can all get behind, and for once it paid off, as Sri regularly picked up wickets at the back end of the WOCC innings. In between, Taha managed to cut loose and blazed his way to 39 off 23 balls, including two sixes that were slog-swept with such authority that the club can expect to receive a strongly worded email from Luxembourg air traffic control. Taha fell to the last ball of the WOCC innings, giving Sri 4 wickets for 38 from his 6 overs but the WOCCers felt confident their total of 198 was plenty good enough.
The lunch break was mostly spent reassuring Akhi that he should use gloves when keeping wicket.
Any doubts about whether Akhi was up to the task of keeping began to dissipate as he snapped up anything that came his way. Jalal bowled a heavy ball and tested out the middle of the pitch but the oppo openers proved up to the task on this occasion. Ed bowled a tight spell from the other end, only conceding 7 runs from his 5 overs. In another unorthodox move, Sri decided that Salil (20 off 47 balls) had batted long enough and should retire out; probably the first time a player has been given out by his own team, and perhaps allowing Sri to claim a 5-for?
The WOCC seamers continued to toil without any luck. Shameek bowled in great areas and went for only 25 in his 5 overs, and Daniel looked threatening once he found a bit of rhythm. Somehow we all knew the action would only really start once the spinners came on though. Taha claimed the key wicket of Anshuman with his first ball, and the evergreen Mike West was also soon in on the act. When Mike and Taha combined to remove Anoop before he could really get going, WOCC knew the game was there for them to lose. Some lusty blows from Abhishek and good running between the wickets narrowed WOCC’s advantage but the boys got the job done. Akhi’s rebirth as a wicket keeper was completed as he took two neat stumpings off Phil, who rolled back the years with 3 for 13 from his two overs at the death.
The umpires were top class, the ground was superb and we all look forward to being able to enjoy a cold beverage after games like this in due course.