Alpine F1 CC at Great Tew, 20 overs.
Scorecard - www.pitchero.com/clubs/bodleiancc/teams/255079/match-centre/0-5537418/scorecard With a recent spell of typically English summer weather that meant only ducks of the quacking variety were likely to be seen on any cricket pitch, it was with some trepidation that Bodley eyed-up a panoply of weather forecasts and ‘Apps’, and Busby consulted his trusty lichen, hoping for that longed-for ‘break’ in the weather that would finally get the season back on track after a frustrating soggy spell that had seen potentially enjoyable and profitable games cancelled. And so rather like Eisenhower in June ‘44, it came as a great relief when Bodley’s man on the ground Dave Freeman confirmed that despite yet more rain, the pitch at Great Tew was looking as good as the warming blue skies above, and that the traditional, tightly fought contest between Bodley and Alpine F1 would be on after-all. As this was a mid-week Twenty20 it did mean the first challenge was to actually get up to Tew by the designated start time, which this year saw a seemingly endless series of roadworks replacing the once traditional Range Rover gridlock – otherwise known as Countryfile Live – all sent to try the patience of what can, on occasion, prove to be a somewhat irascible collection of Librarians and associated fellow travellers. Despite such challenges however, team Bodley had valiantly managed to assemble pretty much on time, and as seems to be the case these days, would be fielding an eclectic mix of old-hands and youthful endeavour. Stuart Ackland, Dave Busby, James Shaw and Tim Philipson were joined by Andy Milner, who had recently returned from some vigorous manoeuvres in the Mumbles, and arrived today bedecked in what appeared to be nautical casuals, giving the impression that he had just stepped off the set of Howard’s Way. Occasionals Richard Hadfield, Archie Lewins, Arthur Contero-Olsen, Jack Perkin, and recent recruit ‘Tuppy’ Morrissey were also along for the ride, as well as Pete West, who would be graciously loaned to Bodley by Alpine when fielding. Facing us were a few familiar faces from past encounters, but as is the way with all things Formula 1 there seemed to be a few tweaks and changes to the line-up this year, which they hoped would get them to the chequered-flag ahead of the opposition. So, all-in-all there was, well, all to play for. Ackland was clearly still on a high following his recent Brearley-esque captaincy masterclass against Saxlingham Gents, and sought to demonstrate his art yet again. He was well and truly in ‘the zone’, and had been mugging up on Bodley’s former ‘Director of Fitness’ Stephen Arnold’s latest bestseller on the art of leadership: “There is no ‘F’ in Prophet”, which seemed fairly apt, all things considered. Despite this, the omens were somewhat inauspicious when it transpired that Ackland had in fact forgotten to bring his kit, and so had to borrow some rather fetching sportswear from young-gun Morrissey. Still, perhaps a smidgen of genuine sporting prowess might be wicked-up into the Ackland pores in some sort of textile-osmosis, and Bodley would triumphantly enact their very own cricketing Agincourt this glorious summer’s evening? Only time would tell of course, and that time was now well and truly upon us. Opening the batting would be yet another new partnership of Hadfield and Morrissey, who looked every inch the consummate cricketing ‘professionals’ they in fact were. This was perhaps fortuitous, as it was equally clear that Alpine had brought some very useful bowling to the field, and scoring would prove to be hard won today, with few boundaries to ease the pressure on batters to keep the total ticking over. To make matters worse the ball seemed determined to find the edge of the Bodley bat, and it was perhaps unfortunate for Morrissey that it was only his edge to slip that was held, forcing his departure for not many, and Bodley wondering if the ghost of Jacob Marlingford had once again reared its beastly head to thwart Bodley’s ambitions. Although forsaking the once traditional white hat for a blue helmet, succour was thankfully forthcoming in the form of Lewins, who had demonstrated the art of assured batting on previous occasions, and once again stepped up to the task before him, providing a useful foil for Hadfield at the other end as they opportunistically chased down all potential runs to keep the Bodley innings on track. Having doggedly clawed his way to the twenty-five retirement, Hadfield was replaced at the crease by Shaw, who added his usual sense of urgency to proceedings and was soon scampering between the stumps like a moggy in pursuit of catnip. Before long Lewins had himself reached his well-deserved retirement, and was replaced in turn by Bodley’s very own ‘Nigel Havers’, Andrew Milner, whose assured athletic swagger clearly indicated that his rumoured Gold Membership of ‘Park Town Flex & Stretch’ had been money well spent. Appearances can be deceptive however, for behind Milner’s rather ‘colonial’ pacific exterior lies a dogged, steely resolve to succeed – like Nureyev giving it large in a pub car park – and it wasn’t long before he was quite literally in his stride, charging down the wicket like a Blackpool Hen-Party trying to catch the Off-License before closing. Before the Bodley contingent had a chance to settle down and watch this most arresting spectacle unfold however – and an ambitious attempt at a leg-side paddle shot had promised much – he was alas undone by a good ball from Sergeant which pressed-flesh with the stumps, and saw him depart with only a couple of hard-earned runs to his name. The premature demise of Milner brought Contero-Olsen to the crease, providing much needed stability and well-taken runs, until Shaw too reached his retirement with his customary impressive strike-rate, making way for Philipson in the nineteenth over. With wickets and retirements in hand there was licence to hit-out or get-out, and Philipson lasted about as long as most expected, though this time managing to pick up a rather unusual Diamond Duck in the process when he was run out at the non-strikers end without facing a ball. On current form, his cricketing epitaph would surely run along the lines of “none the bloody wiser…” This brought Bodley legend Busby out to the middle for an entertaining final cameo to see out the innings, which saw Contero-Olsen retire undefeated after picking up a determined and potentially crucial thirteen runs, which pushed Bodley’s total to a defendable, if rather slight 117 runs. A quick turnaround was the order of the day and Bodley took to the field with West now in tow, somewhat trepidatious about the task in hand but determined to give it their best shot. Afterall, what could possibly go wrong? Now as all lovers of the game will know all too well, cricket is a veritable ‘stat’ machine, producing endless highs, lows and every shade of average in between, and these provide both the individual and the collective endless benchmarks against which performance can be gauged. The humble number ‘forty-two’ for example haunts the psyche of team Bodley, being the lowest recorded innings total – a record that is usually threatened at least once a season. Beyond this are the personal-high run tally’s, the clutch of crucial wickets, and the athletic catches in the field that tip the balance of play. Conversely, there are the passages of play, or moments of madness, that players and teams may wish to forget. Now Ackland’s mercurial cricketing brain had determined to ‘mix up’ the bowling order – a decision that saw Bodley open with Philipson and West, truly a pedal and race car pairing if ever there was one. Upon such decisions do reputations flourish or flounder. Of course, given his lamentable batting ‘performance’ earlier in the game this could have been an opportunity for Philipson to rebuild his hard-won reputation as only a semi-incompetent cricketer, but alas today fate would be taking no prisoners. Never more than an ‘occasional bowler’ in all senses of the word, today saw him pitted against opening batsmen who seemed determined to break any last vestige of human spirit he may have possessed, with Stirrup, and especially Warwick, subjecting him to a merciless pummelling. The free-run cafeteria was well and truly open as he was smashed for a grisly thirty-six runs off a mere two overs, leaving Alpine cantering towards the required total, and Philipson making a mental note that the demands of dignity and duty meant he would have to dig out Bodley’s trusty Service Revolver at the end of the match. Thankfully at the other end West was doing rather better, dismissing Martin with his first ball, and ending his two overs of challenging bowling with yet another wicket, as Sharna was somewhat controversially judged to have been run-out by Alpine’s umpire after some sharp work by Bodley in the field, and Hadfield behind the stumps. Now what follows is going to be a somewhat cursory overview of the passage of play that now ensued. Partly because it was so badly recorded for posterity in the Alpine scorebook, and partly because it was, quite frankly, all a little difficult – even for those taking part – to keep pace with developments as they played out on the pitch. To pick up where we left off however, the end of the first four over spell saw Alpine now galloping away on thirty-nine runs, and it would take the rather more conventional pairing of Ackland and Shaw to try and slam the brakes on the Alpine innings. Compared to what had passed all so recently before, the following four-over spell must be judged as a nothing less than a triumph, and although the scorebook would suggest that a further thirty-nine runs had been conceded, at least the pain was fairly evenly shared, and with the added bonus of Shaw bamboozling Halls with a genuine slower ball to curtail his destructive spell of twenty-two runs that had been acquired in very short-order. It was around this point in the game when things went more than a little peculiar, for with only eight overs gone and almost eighty runs already on the board, even Milner’s Far-Eastern Spot-Betting Syndicate was refusing to take any more wagers on an Alpine win. With Bodley backs well and truly to the wall, what was required was an injection of spin, and right on cue up stepped Morrissey and Milner to try and salvage something, anything, from this confounded game of cricket that seemed to have already spiralled out of control and beyond the desperate grasp of team Bodley. What followed must surely therefore go down as one of the most remarkable passages of play in Bodley’s history, for after an initial two-overs of relative ‘containment’, Morrissey’s leg-spin found the sweet-spot on the wicket and skittled Wallace and Sergeant in successive balls. Unlike his teammates, Hutchinson at least managed to get his bat on the hat-trick ball, but merely carved it in a spooning arc to West at point, who pouched the ball with confident assurance to the delight of team Bodley, who generally find themselves on the receiving end of all thinks hat-trick related. Before anyone could catch their breath, the wicket bonanza continued, when Taylor’s desperate attempt to defend against the turning ball resulted in a dramatic pirouette that took him back into his own stumps. With a rapidly diminishing batting order, and pads going on and off faster than at an ECT Trade Fair, the Alpine Captain looked rather like a superannuated Greek God in receipt of bad news. And things were not about to get any better either, with Milner bagging another couple of wickets from the other end in his second over, with a top-edge taken by Shaw, and a sublime deceived-by-the-flight stumping by Hadfield, who was certainly earning his corn behind the stumps today. And then, without fanfare, it was suddenly over, as Morrissey took the final wicket and Alpine departed the field, all out for 96. Due to the rapid rate of dismissal, it had proved somewhat difficult to keep track of just how many wickets had actually fallen, so it was all a little unexpected when the end finally did come. And given the enormity of the turnaround in fortunes, there were more than a few signs of utter astonishment on the faces of the Bodley contingent. Ackland in particular had an expression that bore more than a passing resemblance to Peggy Ollerenshaw when she had finally secured the sacred Yellowcoat, and even Bodley’s most hardened fan on the boundary was struggling to take in the enormity of what she had just witnessed unfold before her very eyes. And so as congratulations and thanks were offered all around, Bodley retired from the field, each mentally pinching themselves to make sure that they were not in fact dreaming, and that Bodley had indeed managed to secure a most unlikely victory. So, what to make of it all? Frankly it was all a little hard to take in. After a below-par performance with the bat, and a super-charged initial run-chase by Alpine, Bodley had looked well and truly beaten. But once the defensive dam had been initially breached, the wicket trickle soon became a flood, with the spin-spell of Milner and Morrissey in particular delivering a genuine knockout blow to the Alpine innings. Morrissey’s figures of five wickets for only two runs in 3.2 overs – including a hat-trick no less – almost defy rational explanation, and were key to delivering the win. There was also solid support in the field, with vital catches being held, and even if Bodley had eventually fallen short of the line there would have been much to cheer about the overall performance. Special mention must also of course go to Pete West, who gallantly fielded for both sides, though only picking up wickets when bowling against his own Alpine colleagues. As always however, the bones of the match would be picked over by posterity, into whose hands it now assuredly passed. Meanwhile, in the present, there was that peculiar yet comforting sense of exhilaration to bask in that is always the close-companion of success – though in a modest and magnanimous fashion of course. On a more general note, having chalked up yet another victory, perhaps there really was a pattern emerging, with an indiscernible genius somehow underpinning Ackland’s style of captaincy? On the other hand, it was probably best not to ascribe too much talent to a man who couldn’t even remember to bring his own trousers, so, on the balance of probabilities, I think it is safe to say that the jury is still well and truly out on that point. What was beyond dispute however was that yet again the fixture had lived up to its billing as one of the seasons ‘crunch matches’, provided much high-octane drama and excitement, and on this occasion at least, delivered an almost wholly implausible Bodley victory. And so, over a burger and sausage feast provided by our always generous hosts, we could perhaps sit back and reflect on what had just happened. Some Bodley veterans may well recall a game against OUP way back in 2017 when, in similar fashion, a seemingly unlikely victory was snatched out of the jaws of almost certain defeat. The much-lamented Andy MacKinnon penned the report that day, and remarked that is was ‘one of the most memorable and in many ways one of the most unlikely of Bodleian wins in the team’s long and storied history’. I suspect that today’s epic encounter against Alpine will likewise be seared into the collective memory of all those fortunate to bear witness to these remarkable events, and merit its own chapter in the history of Bodley CC when it finally comes to be written. And so, as the sun slowly sank beneath the North Oxfordshire horizon, and the sharp report of the trusty Service Revolver was drowned out by the sound of Busby attempting to squeeze the last of the ketchup onto his sausage bap, all seemed very much right with the world. TP.
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