VIPERS!!!

Mandarins 178 all out (Pete Garratt 53), lost to Taplow 179 for 1 by 9 wickets.

It was cold grey and windy but the welcome from Drew Somerville, late of this parish, and the Taplow Sunday XI was warm. We lost the toss and were inserted into a veritable nest of Vipers (as per Match Report rule No 1). Except it wasn’t really. Variable bounce, certainly, but nothing to fear as confirmed by news that said Somerville currently led the Taplow Sunday bowling averages. The pitch did seem a touch under-grassed – due apparently to the groundsman flouncing off at the end of the previous season instead of seeding his square. This variable grass cover allowed the vipers to writhe. Cap’n Forman done by a low one, Williams bowled off the nipple (NB you won’t find this phrase in the coaching manual). Kishen made it look easy before (he says) becoming victim of a minor audio-visual malfunction on the part of umpire Bob. Chris M went too hard too soon, Zubair had 4 wickets for 14 runs, and so, inevitably “The Spirit of Cricket” removed him from the attack.

This allowed Bob’s friend Pete Garratt, who has guested for us before on the Oxford tour, to use his county experience to muscle an excellent 50, mainly off the back foot through the leg side. With support from Abhijit and then Bob himself, he added 40 for the 5th and 29 for the 6th wicket. But all were out leaving the score a perilous 110 for 7. The tail managed to eke out the available time and 68 vital runs, Saad to the fore, allowing Mandies to finish 178 at tea. Confidence was high, brains trust reckoned 130 might be par (how often have we heard that one??). Claire Somerville then took centre stage with a superb tea (including the requested Welsh cakes), and we set off to defend our total.

Alas! The vipers had been concreted over, and, possibly due to using the old ball (a matter of some controversy, but back in the day a one ball game was always the Mandarin way), Taplow made largely untroubled progress. The Somerville contribution to the day was completed by the deployment of a ball-finding dog who recovered two from the deep brambles. There were four dropped chances, three of them very difficult, from the cavalier Palsford, but Dalgleish, who had scored a century the previous week and was, it has to be said, far too good to be playing at this standard of cricket, moved serenely to 83 before Kishen dived at square leg to snare him off Chaneth. 147 for 1. The captain has admitted to enormous relief that this catch was taken as it was looking odds on our heaviest ever batting first defeat, and only second ever 10 wicket loss, eclipsing 175 for 0 by the BBC in 1998. But that record was left intact, which was a just outcome for our striving and sometimes unlucky bowling attack. 

Chris Baker