A tempter for more cricket; as the weekend got underway with most of a game for the Saturdays away at table toppers Harptree. Then it rained overnight & the respective groundsmen did the honours.
Our partial match with abandonment this weekend came from the Saturday XI's fixture at Harptree Villages. There were some strategic tweets timed to coincide with intervals, but they made grim reading until the last one. 5 down at drinks, then all out for 114, then saved by the rain...abandoned, but that elusive 5th consecutive victory still remains on the cards. Apparently webgimp has still to successfully discriminate his Star Wars robots as our bearded one was run out in this match whilst supposedly dealing pints at the Miners, but at least no-one appeared to have dropped any s***ers.
A few folks came out of this one just making positive figures, but, albeit close in some cases, there were no ducks, & with the 10 points for the abandoned game, ultimately everyone successfully avoided ending up in the negative. Seems like Evan got in pretty early as Grove got his 1 run point & was then run out. Angelo hit a few, making 15 run points, which would see him end up second highest cowboys scorer of the weekend once appearance points were settled. Tooley got 2 run points, Iggy 10 & Kahlu 6, SteveO 2 & Tim 2. Looks like Gretch dug in & stayed around with Ev for a bit & got himself 10 run points before Garnier too hung around for 9 & then the last wicket made it to the ultimate over before RT original found himself run out for 1 going down all guns blazing & leaving Evan with a jug avoiding 46 & a 10 point not out bonus. Chasing 115 for victory the Harptree Hogarths must have sensed the impending abandonment as it looks like they tried to get the game won within the first 15 overs. Only one wicket fell on the way, Kahlu saving his day with a 15 point catch off Tim's bowling leaving him still positive as his 3.2 overs went for 30. The original RT had a day to forget, going for 18 off 2, wiping out most of his appearance score & Garnier's 2 overs for 12 looked positively economical in comparison. Tim's 3 overs went for just 10, & he got that wicket to boot, but when the rain fell at 10.2 overs the Hogarths had reached 70 for 1. And that's where it ended; a lot of low scores even with 10 points for selection. Iggy & Gretch got 20 apiece for their runs, Tim made 29 for tight bowling & Evan played a classic captain's innings, accumulating 66 points & the only properly significant score of the weekend. We now have a libellous but rather amusing report from Grover on the subject.
Despite the shower the previous evening & some overnight rain, Sunday was glorious from mid morning for the rest of the day, which left some of our admin staff suspecting a bladderist conspiracy as both the scheduled games were called off due to boggage way before there'd been any chance of seeing how the day's warm & drying weather would affect the pitches. Called in to use the gloves as the majority of the club keepers went down with apparently bladder unrelated absences, Ang added to his Saturday score with another 10 points, leaving him on 35 for the weekend. Another 21 players got another 10 apiece, but it wasn't enough to stop everyone getting upset for some curious reason as our bladdersport representatives attempted to make up for decades held karmic debts by trying their hardest to steal a victory on penalties, but at least that divisive tribal distraction's all over for another summer. Well, until this Berrow thing anyway...but you'd hope the weather deities could start being a bit more forgiving now soft ground is not required for falling over & rolling around acting on any more....Detailed climate rant postponed due to excessive complexity, cultural intransigence & its unfairness towards cricketers.
Here are the 21 players who got 10 for Sunday: Justin, Neil, Grant, Matt C, Nelly, Wilki, RT2T, Dave L, Andy, James, Bernie, Zabeullah, Amir, Sayed, Omar, Martin, Wayne, Dean, Mark Treacher, Alex & Matt N.
Very little has changed on the player performance front, but Evan made some serious relative progress.
MVP (Most Valuable Player):
This Week:
1st: Evan Gibbons 66 points
2nd: Angelo Bordi 35 points
3rd: Tim Taylor 29 points
Overall:
1st: Rob Taylor 427 points
2nd: Duncan Brewood 387 points
3rd: Ian Higgins 382 points
Ingerlunders of the Week:
1st: Rob Tinkler 1 point
2nd: Mark Wilkinson 10 points
3rd: Admin= 10 points
(2nd & 3rd= selected for budget cost)
Ashley's Arseh*les Team of the Week:
Rich Grove 11 £7Bn
Dave Toole 12 £6Bn
Nelly Musgrave 10 £5Bn
Evan Gibbons 132* £15Bn
Ian Higgins 20 £10Bn
Steve Ormesher 12 £7Bn
Gretch Eller+ 20 £8Bn
Angelo Bordi 35 £10Bn
Tim Taylor 29 £14Bn
Rich Garner 15 £10Bn
Matt Noodles 10 £4Bn
Total: 306 £96Bn
Nelly & Matt get in as Kahlu is too expensive & they're the cheapest, but the 10th & 11th men could just as well be any 2 for < £13Bn combined, from Grant, Andy, Matt C, Dave L, James, Bernet, Amir, Zabeullah, Sayed, Alex, Dean, Wayne, Martin, Omar or Treacher. Looks a bit like our happy Saturday XI, just with Matt & Nelly replacing Kahlu & RT1. Kahlu, costing £15Bn, would still make the Allstars with 14.33, so they'd score 4.33 more points (310.333) & cost £10Bn more (£106Bn).
Trophy Tracker:
League Standings:
1st: Netball Berds 3185 points
2nd: Bat Shit Mental 3132 points
3rd: Smashed It CC 3120 points
Little in the way of major movement to speak of this weekend; Saturday rich teams generally did best & if Ev was captain so much the better. The highest score was Nelly's Johnny Jihads Giants, with 5 of Ashley's specified XI, plus an allstar & some 10 point equivalents, scoring 249.33 to move up to 12th on 2943, whilst Bristol Cowboys set the standard at the other end of the table with 50 for the week, totalling 1322 for the season so far. Everything else was somewhere in between.
Netball Berds are sitting pretty at the top this week after scoring 195, & 116 was enough for Bat Shit Mental to hold silver. Smashed It CC rose to bronze after a weekend of 143 as Himalayan Monkshoods slip into 4th on 3108 after a weekend score of 115. Voltan's Destroyers made characteristically heartless progress up into 5th on 3086 after some sentiment free transfer activity got them 184 this weekend, with All Creased Up, Nooderlaters, Otis McGraw's Blue XI, Horny Mofos & The Rhinestones still right in the running & completing the top 10. Other notable weekend scores featured Insideout on 247, now on 2542 in 49th, & Duck's Eleven on 2923 in 14th after scoring 243. Scott's Welsh CB made 235 & move up into the running on 2777 in 23rd, E11a scored 234 & head in the right direction now on 2453 in 52nd & Angle's War Knee also deserve a mention, as their 229 recovers them into 57th on 2353. Bladdersporters generally had a good weekend, although they might not appreciate the sport in which this was happening, as Vewwy Good Cwicket made Woy's weekend with 212 pulling them up away from the relegation zone to 2077 in 67th, whilst Ultra Casual Cricketers got 209 & now have 1975 in 69th.