Sunday 19th May

Match Report

A patched up Lavant team (welcoming 4 debutants) arrived on a glorious, warm and sun soaked Sunday afternoon to welcome St Jame’s ‘Casuals’ (who turned out to be anything but). There was a feeling that this could be yet again another David VS Goliath match….

With the park surrounded by a healthy Lavant crowd it was nice to see people had popped out to see how this ‘village’ cricket game was to unfold. 

The skipper headed out to the middle and won the toss and elected to bat.

Once introductions were made, kit was distributed and the safeguarding was explained it was game on! 

There was a very ‘experimental’ feel to the Lavant batting line up. One of the main challenges of being Lavant skipper is the team is mostly made up with people who want to only bat at 5 which makes it very hard to pick a 1 to 4! With the captain always happy to lead from the front at 1, the rest of the line up fell into place to take on the challenge of an endless supply of young, accurate quick bowlers. 

Not much can be said of the innings apart from Lavant dug in and showed a lot of fight to not collapse and at least bat through the end. The captain at one end embraced his best inner Geoffrey Boycott trying to grind out a score and hold the innings together whilst the rest of the Lavant batting line up did their best to help support. But, alas, for all the hard effort and fight from the team Lavant could only manage 100 runs (for which there was a ripple of applause from the crowd for the home team reaching 3 figures)! 

Tea was taken (interesting contrast of team chat from the opposition players comparing notes on how they got on in their match on Saturday to Lavants ‘I did a bit of gardening’ or ‘was playing with the kids’ or ‘I had a nice nap and read the paper’) which perhaps slightly highlighted the miss match…

One thing is for sure Lavant will not go down without a fight and took to the field determined to not allow the run chase to be an easy affair.

Tam and Dave started proceedings and did their very best to keep things in check and both missed the edge on several occasions but couldn’t find the breakthrough. With the scoreboard ticking over the skipper turned to Lee and Mark to turn their arms over. Considering the situation of the match and the lack of bowling time it was a big ask for both men (with not many runs left to defend) but they both stuck to the task as well as they could and didn’t let anyone down. Lee managed to pick up the only wicket of the game (removing the set batsman 2 runs before his 50). 

Special mention should go to the 4 new players (Lloyd, Nathan, Rupert and Ylan) who all got stuck in and showed a lot of good effort and willingness in the field making some crucial stops and chasing down balls before they got to the boundary.

However….even with the hard work and fight shown by the home side the inevitable loss came with the opposition number 3 coming in and smashing a 4 and two 6’s to finish the game early. 

I’d just like to say even though most knew that we would probably lose not one head from Lavant dropped, there was no sulking or anger. I was pleased (and happy) that everyone just tried their very best, made the most of it and enjoyed it as best they could and it was great to see.

Even though it felt like Average Joe’s VS Globo Gym Purple Cobras (look up the movie dodgeball if you don’t get the reference) it certainly felt like Lavant had embraced the underdog spirit of Average Joe’s gym. 

I’m starting to think Dave could definitely be ‘Steve the Pirate’ based on the way he seems to be happy when he can plunder people’s money now he’s got that card reader working!! 

And best of all….I’ve not even mentioned the dropped catches this week….

Men of the match go to Lloyd, Nathan, Rupert and Ylan for getting stuck in and showing willing and effort in the field (even in the face of it being a loss cause).

Champagne moment goes to Phil for a dynamic bit of fielding (swooping across the ground, scooping up the ball and hitting the stumps at the bowler’s end)!

Thanks to everyone, well done and onto the next game