21/06/2025
Bala 141ao (40 overs)
MIMCC 144/8 (33.4 overs)
MIMCC win by 2 wickets
Scorecard here: https://nwcl.play-cricket.com/website/results/6817569
June the 21st. The longest day of the year. And it sure was. A win for MIMCC in an attritional game away at Bala that finished just a few minutes before sunset.
Despite having spent the whole week practicing his tossing for 4 hours every night, the skipper stuck with the formbook and swiftly lost the toss. Bala elected to bat on a pitch which looked a vast improvement on last week’s farce at the quay.
Naseer and Umang took the new ball and restricted the scoring against a background of frequent showers. Naseer picked up the breakthrough clean bowling one of their openers, which brought Bala’s overseas player to the crease. Quite how someone from New Zealand finds himself in Bala of all places was not explained. Maybe he was trying to get to Bali and got on the wrong plane.
Bala’s skipper and overseas pro proceeded to put on a key partnership as Umang, Saboor, and Deepak plugged away. The scoring rate never got out of hand, but a wicket proved elusive – especially via the lbw route (assured by the diligent work of everyone’s favourite umpire). The breakthrough came when the skipper turned to spin with Venkat and Z. The batters were struggling to get Venkat away, and at the other end Z once again proved himself the golden arm, dismissing the overseas pro caught at fine leg by Venkat. This opened up an end and wickets then started to fall. Z picked up his second wicket caught by Abs at cover, and then 2 more bowled in his next over to register his second 4-fer of the season for figures of 4-29. Venkat (1-19) then managed to bamboozle Bala’s loanee from Dolgellau to the extent that he trod on his own stumps. Naseer (3-20) and Deepak (1-19) returned to mop up the last few wickets, and Abs ran out everyone’s favourite umpire off the final ball of the innings. The reigning div 4 wicketkeeper of the season even managed to break his season-long duck behind the stumps to draw him level with such luminaries as Messrs Ford and Sunderam in the wicketkeeping statistics.
40 overs bowled in a touch under 3 hours, including a 15-minute rain delay.
After tea, Venkat joined Abs at the top of the order, hoping this appearance as an opener would not end the same way as the last one (hospital…..). Venkat was also equipped with his own helmet this week after a mix up with Applewhite-branded lids last week had seen Venkat impersonating a bobble head in the skipper’s helmet which was several sizes too big for him. Sadly, a correctly sized helmet couldn’t save him from umpire Trigger Ford who sent Venkat on his way lbw for 1. This brought Deepak to the crease to join Abs.
The same 2 players who had done the job for Bala with the bat were also proving to be their best bowlers by some distance. It was clearly going to be a matter of seeing these 2 off and then looking to score the runs against the change bowlers. Unfortunately wickets continued to fall.
In cricket there are only 2 types of leave – the good one, and the bad one. Sadly Deepak demonstrated the latter against their skipper to lose his off stump. Apples (lbw for 5) and Umang (bowled for a duck) followed him back to the pavilion. This prompted a change in batting order as Fordy was promoted to 6 with orders to see off the strike bowlers. This he did to great effect, while also scoring at better than a run a ball. Fordy raced to 19 before an abortive attempt and a second saw him run out.
At the other end, Abs was holding the innings together as the wickets tumbled. He was joined by Saboor who was initially uncharacteristically watchful before reverting to type against much weaker change bowling.
As the runs required for ticked down, Abs passed 50 for the second time this season, before eventually holing out to an excellent catch by the overseas pro a deep mid-wicket. This was a spectacular catch, especially as he was fielding with a damaged finger which had been kindly repaired by Venkat.
This brough the skipper to the crease, who had spent the past several hours nervously pacing the boundary and chuntering about slow over rates. Clearly not in the best of headspaces, yours truly was promptly bowled round the legs first ball.
I cannot describe the rest of the game in any great detail as I was otherwise engaged in the dressing room hurling items of my apparel at the wall and contemplating exactly which point on the lake I would throw my kitbag into. However, the scorecard tells me that Niall joined myself and Umang in the duck club, but that ultimately Saboor and Naseer did the business and saw us home with plenty of overs to spare.
33.4 overs bowled in 3 and a quarter hours, with no rain delays.
As night fell over Bala we left with 11 points. Good to get back to winning ways. MIMCC will be looking to carry this on away at Halkyn next week, and to hopefully get home before midnight.