The Wolfman's Cricket Blog

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We didn't play this weekend as a team pulled out just before the start of the season so there is an odd number of teams, so it was our turn to have a day off. Worked well for us as it rained so no-one else played anyway!
 
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We won yesterday, report to come tommorow. I also have another game tommorow, so it will be a double installment.
 
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I was just thinking everyone must think my blogs are really boring - you must be like "I wonder how wolf did this week? Oh yeah, another win". In truth I think we have been surprised at how well we have been doing this season, we finished 4th in this league last season but this year we are halfway through the season and our record is now Played 10, Won 7, Winning draw 1, Losing draw 1, Abandoned 1. Now we have played everyone (minus the 2nd placed team, which was the abandoned match) we can clearly see we are too good for this league. We have a lot of people who contibute with bat and ball, and that is what is so good about this team, we are not a one/two player wonder, it seems every match we have someone different who steps up to the plate and wins us the match. Being the 5th team at the club we also have to cope with the fact that if someone does exceptionally well they will be moved up. If we get promoted this year we will move to within a league of the 4ths and two leagues of the 3rds so the competition to be the highest team will definately be there.

We played the team that were in 3rd place (now 4th) on Saturday. They have had to recently move ground as Walsall FC have built their academy on their cricket pitch, so we had to play on a sort of makeshift ground, artificial pitch, and it had an athletics track in the middle of it, as well as a bit of litter in places. Winning the toss on a artificial pitch is a no-brainer, you have to bowl, and bowl we did. With our skipper injured and our normal opening bowler missing, I was briefed beforehand that I could be required to bowl. I felt the opposition played very poorly, they played too agressively on a difficult track and paid the price. We had them at about 70-7, wickets shared, including a seventh catch of the season for me and one brilliant dismissal in which the bowler dropped a return catch with his fingertips but it carried all the way to mid-off who did manage to catch it. I was brought on with the score on about 80, and I bowled the best I have bowled for a while, quite fast and consistently on a good length, and finished with figures of about (didn't check the scorecard afterwards) 5-1-18-2. Twelve of those runs were from edges through the slips for four (slips consisted of our injured skipper and our 60 year old who had been caned on the shins by a ball early on, so they were not the most mobile). I decided instead of relying on them I should just bowl them out, so my two wickets were balls that went through the gate and hit middle. They ended up on 110 all out after 35.1 overs, giving us 64 overs to get 111.

I opened the innings and managed to get 23 runs of 25 overs. They were a very good bowling team, particulary their offspinner, who was the best bowler I had faced all season, turning the ball a mile, and with a lot of overs to chase a low total, I went for a low risk strategy. I got out going down the wicket to try and nudge a single off the offie and getting bowled, leaving our team on 45-4, which soon turned into 70-7 and out nerves were going to be tested. Fortunately we have a very good tail and out no.7 and no.9 saw us through with the loss of just one more wicket (which was when the scores were level).

We now stay top, 28 points ahead of 2nd, 43 points ahead of 3rd and 58 points ahead of 4th.

Report of Monday's match coming later...

Added 5 hour(s), 15 minute(s) and 24 second(s) later...

Anyway on Monday I played for the Greenflies, a team kind of like the MCC who play random friendlies, but just against team from the local area (say within a hour and a half radius). We were playing at the Express & Star ground, which is a three minute walk from my home ground.

A strange twist of fate happened before that though, I arrived an hour early due to unforseen circumstances, and as I walked past my ground I noticed there was a couple of matches on so I decided I might as well watch some cricket to fill up the time. It looked like some kind of festival/tournament anyway, as they were two matches on and they were all wearing the same shirts. Anyway, I got asked by one of the teams to play as they only had nine players, so I said yes as long as I could leave to get on time for my other match. I got padded up and was told it was a T20 match and we were about 15 overs in. After a couple of wickets fell I went in with 2 balls to go but off strike. A single gave me the strike for the last ball, which I clipped past mid-on for four! As a team we finished on 155, and after a quick changeover I stayed on the field for 5 overs before I had to go, bowling one over for 8 on the last of those. It seemed a decent standard of cricket altogether, I fear my team probably lost with only nine fielders.

Anyway onto the match I came to play, we were playing a team from a church, they all looked like they had played some sort cricket at some point, although they were a bit unfit or out of practice.

It was a 40 over game and we batted first. I was at no.7 and came in on about 80-5, scoreboard looked a bit more rosy on 200-6 when I came off after my skipper retired me on 62. Strange innings, scored quickly to start with but got bogged down during the middle, going about 8 overs without a boundary before hitting my last five balls for 4 4 4 4 6. We finished on 256-9, and restricted them to 180-9 in reply.
 
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Yes, you guessed it, another win for us today.

Generally it was an awful day rain came and went so we had to keep dragging the plastic covers on and off. Our normally reliable pitch had developed some steepling bounce in the month we have been on the road, which sort of suited us as we a class above the opposition who had a lot of U16's out (although to be fair we have a few, but ours are very good) so that meant it was difficult for them to get the losing draw as they won the toss and bowled first.

We amassed a total of 245-5 before we declared after 45 overs, of course set up by my innings consisting of 7 runs. Big opening partnership, I came in and nudged a few singles but one ball reared up off a length and hit my thumb and looped up to silly mid off. I felt there was not much I could do really so I wasn't down or anything. For the final 25 overs I umpired and witnessed some great stroke making by the oldest and youngest members of the team (60 and 14 respectively). who put on a hundred partnership before we declared.

I could tell the pitch suited my bowling to the ground, being 6'2 I made use of the bounce of the wicket and took 8-1-35-2, hit for 20 runs off the last two overs but in the whole spell the emphasis was on attacking and getting wickets so I wasn't worried about that. Bowling second change I managed to get their no.3 out with a ball that climbed severley on him and he could only loop it in the air for me to catch running towards mid-wicket. I then managed to get one of the kids out by ruffling him up for four balls and then sending in the yorker. I also had a couple of dropped chances in the slips/keeper, we certainly need to work on the catches behind. Anyway I have been well chuffed with my bowling last two games, and I am finally working up a good pace and bowling accurately at the same time, something which has deserted me in the past. We bowled them out in the 45th over for around 170, a good team performance again, and as we all realised afterwards pretty much everyone contributed.

I play another Greenflies game tommorow (actually make that today), and I might have another one on Wednesday as well.
 
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Congrats Wolf - you must be getting bored of winning at this stage! Is there a higher league for you guys to get promoted into for next season?
 
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Yeah definately getting a tad boring! There is a higher league to go into, and I think that will be our level, we got relegated from that league two years ago, but I reckon we can hold our own there.
 
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Is your team the first XI for your club??

We had something similar a couple of years ago when I was just starting to play saturday cricket in that we went undefeated one year but the next year half the team got promoted to the 1st XI and we really struggled to cope with the higher level.
 
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5th X1. We're a big club lol. There's not that much of a difference i quality between the 3rds/4ths/5ths really though, if we get promoted we will just be a league below the 4ths.
 
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Cool, sounds like you'll cope fine with it. I'd love to be in a club with loads of teams - we always end up struggling to get 2 teams out.
 
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Oh dear. We suffered our first full loss of the season on Saturday. Thankfully the team in 2nd place suffered the same fate.

We were originally meant to play on a grass wicket, but after rain delayed the start we moved to a artificial wicket. We lost the toss and were inserted in. We reached 188-6 of our 50 overs, which was not quite good enough. I scored 1, smacking a short ball straight into the hands of cover. The ball begged to be hit to be honest, one metre either side of the fielder it would have been a four.

Bowling we just leaked runs first up, but we did take two wickets. Me and the leggie started to turn the screw though, I bowled 6-1-9-0, and the leggie had simular figures. I had two big LBW shouts turned down, one of which I felt was definately out. Our skipper then took us both off for no particular reason and the high runrate came back, and they got the total in the 38th over for three wickets down.
 
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Maybe ur skipper wanted to keep ur overs for later stages as u and the other had bowled very well and then attack with fast bowlers to get wickets.But 188 is also a low score to defend...for that all the bowlers have to bowl accurately.
 
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We have an unlimited number of overs to bowl, so I could have bowled right through if needed.
 
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We lost again!

I scored 15 opening on a dodgy track, we were all out for 143 in the 45th over. If we batted out our overs we would have won, as they passed the total in the 52nd over for eight wickets down, thanks mainly to a partnership of about 35 for the eighth wicket. I was pressed into emergency wicketkeeper duty, keeping for the first time in three years (and only the 5th time ever) I thought I did pretty well only 3 byes I think and took a low catch.
 
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It's all your fault.

Nah seriously, you kept fkn brilliant. First time in three years and you only let though 3 byes? Wow. Our keeper once let through 1 (although it really was 2, they didn't see the second) bye in 50 overs. Congrats dude. Bad luck on the loss though.
 
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I didn't play due to a wedding but my babes won at the weekend. Bowled 'em out for 124 and knocked it off for one wicket down. I fear my opening spot has gone though.
 
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I was right, my opening spot was gone, but it doesn't matter as I scored 95 batting at no.5 on Saturday!

I had a marathan three day cricket weekend starting with a Greenflies match on Friday. We batted first (mainly because five of our team including me were stuck in one car running very late). It was a 90 over declaration game, so when we felt we had enough runs we could just declare. Firstly I have to say the pitch was v.poor, low and slow, if you sent in a bouncer it would just die. We started fairly well but collapsed to 60-6, with a second ball duck for me. I have a tendancy when playing a forward defensive shot to lunge forward and the ball will sometimes loop upwards and that is what happened here and I was caught close in. Really annoyed about that as I had took some gentle ribbing about my batting technique (which is admitadely quite poor but sometimes effective, at least it is unique I say) before my innings. Anyway, a big seventh wicket partnership rescued us and we declared on 151-8 after 49 overs, leaving them 41 overs to pass our score. We didn't have a keeper so I was asked and said yes. It was a close chase, but we felt most of time we had it in the bag but unfortunately they past our total with a single off the last ball. I would have liked a bowl but I was happy keeping and I felt I did fairly well considering the poor bounce of the pitch.

Onto the Saturday match - it was 1st v 2nd - crunch time. The atmosphere was quite tense in the dressing room, and that increased when we lost the toss and were put in. We even had a conversation about the batting order, normally the captain just reads out the line-up and we just get on with it, but a few people had some input this time. The opposition's opening bowling partnership was a strange combination, a fast left armer which bowled bouncers 60% of the time, and a very slow bowler, which got the ball to lift up off a length (mainly due to a bouncy pitch, I think). We started at a fast pace but lost three early wickets, and I came in at about 30-3 with the pressure firmly on. I started off really well pulling the left armer for four. That one shot told me all I needed to know, I could feel it was going to be a big innings for me. Wickets continued to fall at the other end while my innings really prospered and we were fluondering at 90-7 when I was joined by the guy I had a big partnership with earlier in the season when I made 81. We put on 88 for the eighth wicket, of which he contributed about 15, but his job was to stay with me while I scored runs. My five favourite shots were fed to me all day, the pull, the clip of my legs, the cut, the forcing shot off the back foot through the covers and the smash down the ground against the spinner, and I hit four after four after four, and it all became a bit of a blur! I got out for 95 with five overs to go, clean bowled by the left armer. Gutted not to get my first ever century, but not to unhappy as I would have took 95 before the game and it was an important knock for the team. We were all out for 196 after 49.1 overs.

Bowling wise we were never really in trouble of having our score overtaken as we bowled tight lines and restricted them well, but after 35 overs we had only taken two wickets, I had took a catch and had a blatant run-out turned down by an umpire who was clearly cheating. I came on and bowled poorly, but returned the figures of 5-1-9-4 guess it was my lucky day, two caught behinds a c&b and a bowled, none of them really wicket taking balls! They are my best bowling figures for about four years when I took 5 wickets with my legspin in a junior match! They ended up on 169-8 so we got a winning draw and stretched our lead at the top to 25 points.

On Sunday I had heard nasty rumours about this league I was playing in, and I was not to be disappointed, it was a 40 over slog-a-thon. Apparently the team I was playing for was bottom and the team we were playing were top which didn't exactly bode well. We made 133 all out off 32 overs, our opener scored 60 and everyone else failed I got stumped off a medium pacer off a ball outside the leg stump for 2. I opened the bowling but got took off after being smacked over my head for six and two overs for 16. Everyone else got smacked as well though and we were thrashed, but I took a high catch at cow corner to take my tally for the season to 12.
 
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Another win today and we are closing in on promotion.

We won the toss and had no hesistation in bowling first on a bad wicket. After my four wickets from the last match I was promoted to first change. Our captain knew the opposition team well and said that they only had three batsmen, their openers and the no.4, and he turned out to be right. Their openers looked competant but I got one of them out chasing a wide one and the skipper got the other with a grubber. I then got the number 3 playing on but their other decent player had an excellent knock getting about 70 odd but had a lack of support and we shot them out for 147. I picked up my third wicket getting the no.4 LBW to finish of the innings in the 45th over. Overall I bowled nine overs for about 30 odd runs. The innings was highlighted by no less than five LBW's by the same umpire, one of them seriously dodgy (hit the guy on the thigh and only the keeper half-appealed). That is surely a record in club cricket with a 'home' umpire. He turned down two blatant LBW shouts for me though.

Needing 148 to win off 55 overs we never looked in trouble (except for the rain) despite another dodgy LBW, this time from me (on hindsight the batter got an inside edge). Our other opener got 74* for his first 50 of the season and we eased home for only three wickets down and me at no.6 wasn't needed. Farcial circumstances at the end though, with about 20 runs needed the opposition decided they had enough of playing in rain and wanted to go off, we obviously wouldn't let them as we needed the points, so they just decided to bowl lollipops and kicking the ball over the boundary etc e.g. anything to increase the run rate. Poor form from them.
 
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Forgot to say all about last week. We were bowled out for 70 (duck for me) and had the oppo 30-6 but their seventh wicket pair put on 40 and won the match. I bowled 2 overs for 5 at the end. Oh yeah and I took my best catch ever, leaping about seven metres to my right at cover.
 
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