India and the Ring of Fire

To the sounds of our theme song, Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire", history was made today.

When we are old, and grey and full of sleep we will tell of the day when we bestrode the world cricketing stage like a colossus; when Indian channel 20 played our highlights with reverence and little reference to the scores.

We have made an impression on this tournament as the team who are - in the words of one commentator - "unafraid to lose". We are in fact so unafraid at losing that we have lost every match.

Shot of the Day:An Englishman became the first man to hit a ball out of the Rajiv Gandhi Test Ground: no mean feat; mind you, as Jamie Cameron's along-the-ground shot had to beat square legs dive, go down the main the exit, dodge the rabid dogs, and bounce along a cart path into the car park to do so...

Generosity: We are not most generous hosts - the Indians have been great - but none more so than their hospitable first slip today who dropped 3 catches [including Q's first ball]. His captain promptly moved him only for him to drop another at cover ... His teammates were heard asking him if he was not from Lucknow but from Leicester.

Innings of the tournament: Q - the skip - hit 66 not out in a valiant leading from the front displayed of controlled hitting ... This would have been better if he had not discovered after only 2 shots with his "new" and "oh such a good deal" triple-decker bat that he had cracked it. We feel that the bargain was a little too good to be true.

Wickets: as usual our only catch wins catch of the day ... would that there were more but we only took two wickets. This second wicket being due reward for a great spell from Ian MacDougal [now known as the Doooougmeister/ Dougie Donnelly / The Doooug /or just plain Dougal from from Magic Roundabout].

The catch was one touched by the hand of God - or if not God then a showman or show off of epic proportions ... Diving [as usual in our team "like a leaping salmon" - more in hope than expectation] at short cover Guy Opperman clung to the small red ball with a viguor that most of us have only displayed when grasping the toilet seat as we undergo our own particular Indian ring of fire.

But frankly this was not what the crowd came to see. Having caught the ball our shy retiring all rounder was off on a near circuit of the ground. What followed was unquestionably the celebration of the tournament as he dived over the two giant turds left by the ever present pack of marauding rabid dogs [escaping from their lair in the directors' box] in the traditional Harbajhan Singh/Lord Percy style, and let loose the now traditional acceptance of the "Party Invitation" whilst pulling his trademark Henman punch.

Phrase of the Day: this was Q, who got a bit overexcited by the Indian batsman playing and missing outside off stump. We all agreed he was wafting at the ball and Q in excitement said "Come on lads, watch out for the wasp"; being charitable - this was the first time on tour we had no idea what he was talking about.

Sadly several members of the team - loyal lemmings that we are - and despite the fact that our skipper was talking gibberish - also started shouting: "look out for the wasp!". What made it worse was when the Indian batsman stopped taking guard and said "Is there a wasp?"

Several of us have been affected by the heat: none more so than James Cartwright, who in our warm-up today suddenly descended into the mysteries of the Orient. He launched a tirade against the Japanese, which culminated - all this during our stretching session - in him explaining how good he was at karate, how many heads the Japs liked to cut off and finished with him telling us how good they were at "yogi", which he assured us was not a cartoon character.

Grown men celebrated another thrashing by touring the stadium singing the Great Escape, the Dambusters and other classics theme tunes much to the amusement of our hosts

HIGHLIGHTS:
When Dave SuperHarmy came on to bowl we had 2 slips[for the first time this week] and a leg slip. This leg slip was a brave move, as he has an interetsing approach to line and length. On occasions he has been known to aim for leg slip. Placed there was our fearless Shropshire Lad Deni Matthews - he who had previously announced he was batting so badly he could not hit a cows arse with a shovel ... the fearles leg slip was heard to comment: "I'm closer to the batsman than I get to my wife"; as the ball was dispatched past him at speed he was heard to mutter that "it went further than he did on his holidays!!".

POSTSRCIPTS TO THE PREVIOUS GAME:
Sadly we have to report that the Pakistan wicket keeper's gloves were stolen from their lunchtime position by the stumps and then eaten by a rabid dog who pronuonced them quite tasty.

MATCH REPORT:
The big day .. the big game ..India v England in the Hyderabad Test Ground

A big crowd gathered to watch the cricketing titans face off; predictably India won but how we played!!

ENGLAND: 145 for 6 off 35 overs
INDIA: 146 for 2 off 22

WE WILL CELBRATE WITH THE MOTHER OF ALL SINGALONGS IN THE BAR

PAKISTAN SUFFER A NARROW ESCAPE ... NOT!

Another beautiful day in the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium; we were glad to be playing on a proper test ground. More of the match below but here are a few phrases of the day:

1. Deni Matthews - a good tourist who has withstood abuse aplenty from batsmen [and from his own team] and battled on manfully: today he "slightly" misjudged 2 catches from our new not demon bowler Opperman whilst fielding at very very deep and long on. Having failed to catch the ball 3 Indians who were watching the match from behind him in the stand said:

"What sport do you play?"

"You should expect the ball Matthews" [we have our names on our shirts and the locals love to cry out our names]

Deni was then slightly thrown when one of his own team urged him to get over the fact that he had been hit for 4 ["did it to keep him on strike skip"] by "showing some shropshire spunk"

2. Jamie Williams: batted well for 2 hours 18 minutes for 39 runs - clearly we are not aware it is a limited overs game!! He opened and was second last man out.
However, he should have been out cheaply when their demon fast bowler landed a howitzer on his big toe plumb in front; everyone howled...the opposition in appeal and then disbelief when the umpire refused the appeal...Jamie howled as he thought his big toe had ben broken!

3. The Umpires- they had a shocker; having wrongfully reprieved Jamie Williams one gave Oopperman and MacDougall out to slightly dubious LBW decisions but his big error was giving Jamie Cameron out first ball to a ball that Jamie played and missed at. The Pakistanis appealed for the click when Jamie hit his pad as he groped at thin air. Sadly the umpire gave him out for the ball hitting his glove - Jamie was a good foot from the ball. We hope we do not see him again tomorrow when we play India as he was trigger happy

4, How far the ball travels: other teams hit many sixes - we have yet to hit one!! We are convinced that they play
"with triple deckers and we play with the equivalent of a M&S healthy option

5. The game:

shot of the day - Guy Holland - but he got out
catch of the day - Ina Macdougall - but that only introduced their century making batsman

scores:

Pakistan: 334 for 6
England - all out for 107

ooops

India tomorrow

Postscript to today's play at The Railway Ground

Dave "SuperHarmy"Rhodes fielding in the deep faced a towering catch on the boundary; shortly before he dropped it he said to himself "where's that fucking sheep skull - I don't want to turn an ankle" [for details of the location and identification of said sheep skull read on] ...

Match Report - Game 3 - England vs West Indies

Picture the scene dear reader...

The South Central Railway Ground in Secunderabad is a flat pitch overlooked by a hill: on that hill are a collection of very basic houses, a large number of rabid dogs, a large open air public toilet and [10 yards higher up the hill than the latrine] the Calvary Baptist Church; the other side of the pitch is the main railway line

Our visiting MCC correspondent used two expressions to describe the area around the ground: first he called it "rural"; he later revised his description to "derelict"

Today we needed a miracle and sadly the Good Lord did not provide...

But he did provide the following:

1. Some hazards at long on / long off: Deni Matthews and Guy Opperman struggled at "Cowpat Corner" with the cow and dog poo on the pitch - Deni said it reminded him of cricket in Shropshire till we found the skull of dead sheep and a large amount of small bones
We thought it was a goat till our sole Welsh representative Jamie Williams said " thats definitely a sheep - makes me feel quite homesick"

2. Sledging by your own side: it is fair to say that our strike bowler Deni Matthews had a mixed day - a good opening spell was followed by just one of those overs where the bowler does not seem to know where the batsman's is standing [in truth - several memebers of of travelling band of bits and pieces men / doughty warriors have also suffered this same ordeal]; amidst this tough ordeal which the big man bore well - our skip for the day Sam B yelled out "Deni - how's your hamstring?" The shorpshire star was too emotional to reply but duly provided a helpful long hop to keep the boys amused and boost our frequent running miles in the field

3. Bob Percy Hall took the catch of the day - it has to be the catch of the day because we only took 2 wickets and the other was LBW [a mercy killing from a dodgy umpire who seemed to spend most of the match on his mobile]

Fielding at short mid wicket our living deity dived like a leaping salmon to his right, caught the ball off James Cartwright's bowling, rolled over twice for maximum effect and then did the clenched hands together salute in euphoria.

Quote of the moment after this gratutitous grandstanding was Guy Holland who said:
"I thought he had had a heart attack - I only ran over to give CPR!"

4. Consistency: once again we hit our regular target of 53 wides a game - with our usual disdain for line and length!

5. Health report: the downward spiral gathers momentum - sadly Q succumbed shortly before tucking into his deep fried ravioli last night; Jamie very sweetly described his ever lengthening session in the bog as "He's just having some Q time!" This Q time lasted longer than any of the teams innings so far - but Q is recovering and has got off lightly - 3 of the team have lost a stone each during their illnesses.

Breakfast is like a roll-call scene in a world war one flying movie - imagine Dawn Patrol with some red faced Errol Flynn types clutching their buttocks - and saying "I am not sure about the quick singles today lads - you may have to fight this battle without me".

Today Dave "Super Harmy" Rhodes manfully - if a little gingerly - bowled two overs before nearly throwing up on a rabid dog who was attemping a pitch invasion and then breaking land speed records to run from deep mid wicket to the ecstasy of the toilet and the joy that is gastric release ....

WEST INDIES:
309 for 2

ENGLAND:
1. Gullick 64 [a good knock that deserved better support]
2. Williams 28
3. Dodd 1
4. Holland 1
5. Opperman 25
6. Cameron 2
7. Butterfield 1
8. Matthews 4
9. Percival 1
10. Cartwright 6 NO
11 Macdougall 6 NO

Total 174

Would love to say the LBW s were not plumb or correct but that would be harsh on the telephone umpires

FOR THOSE IN ANY DOUBT WE GOT THRASHED!!

We play the Pakistan in 2 days - we are not the bookmakers choice! We are very hospitable opponents

The ladies - as ever - remain perfectly composed and are shopping well

Match Report - Game 2 - England vs Sri Lanka

Any day you do not go to work and you play cricket for your country on a test ground is a good day ...

But...Sad to report we came second to a disciplined Sri Lankan side at the Old Test Ground - known as the Lal Badahur Stadium today.

Sri Lanka batted first and made 244 - despite being only 101 after 20 overs. We played well as a unit, but our bowling struggled with the stringent wides rules and - unlike the first game - we struggled to hold on to our catches. Some were taken, and Ian MacDougal got a good run out with a direct hit, but 4 very makeable cacthes were put down and 3 tough ones as well.

All that having been said we really competed in the field - chasing everything and loving the atmosphere - if not the 30 odd degree heat.

The pick of the bowlers were our opening pair - Sam "Bananas" Butterfield kept it tight and Deni Matthews removed both openers; Q took a wicket with his first ball and ended up with 2-42 and Mat Gullick also took one.

Both Butterfield and Opperman grassed chances for catch of the tournament.

As to the batting, we struggled against tight bowling. We made a slow start despite our best efforts; there was a chance when Q and Sam Butterfield were going well that we could up the pace and make a good effort at the target, but slowly the run rate climbed and we perished in a search for quick runs, and a hat trick for the Sri Lankan slow left armer. Opener Mathew Gullick was top scorer with 40, but all the top order struggled against a two-paced pitch with variable bounce. It was good to see Guy Holland rise from his death bed to play - although he has lost a stone in the last few days due to illness.


SCORECARD:
Sri Lanka: 244 for 7

ENGLAND

1 Gullick 40
2. Williams 3 [slightly dodgy LBW]
3. Holland 8
4. Newcombe 18
5. Butterfield 14
6. Opperman 3
7. Rhodes 7
8. MacDougal 0
9. Matthews 0 [a particularly hard LBW decision against the big man]
10. Cartwright 0
11. Bob Percy Hall [still a legend in India and all asia for stopping one ball whilst standing up with a full bklow to the chest] 3 not out [and not dismissed in the tournament]

Total 124

Lost by 120 runs

Phrase of the day:

Q: "My bat is broken - I am going to smash it against the wall and get rid of the days frustrations"
Deni Matthews: "I wish my bat would smash against anything" - sadly Deni has not actually hit a ball as yet

GENERAL UPDATE:
Health: a lot of the team are struggling and we will be buying shares in Imodium soon; Pete Dood and Jamie Cameron sat the day out by the pool recovering.

Next game: tomorrow we play the West Indies at the Railway Ground in Secunderabad

Team spirit is good: Q is called Winston by many of the hotel staff and Mat Gullick has become King of the Karioke - reeling off 3 numbers to thunderous applause last night

Functions: we are invited to around 4 a day - the pace is frenetic - our hosts are very generous.