Forfarshire Cricket Club 3rd XI v Kinloch on Sun 13 May 2012 at 1pm

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Forfarshire Cricket Club 3rd XI v Kinloch on Sun 13 May 2012 at 1pm
Forfarshire Cricket Club Lost 123 runs

Match report
This veteran correspondent has experienced playing cricket in some horrendous conditions down the years. This includes games stopped because of hailstones, sudden snow flurries causing the square to turn white and visits to the cliff top home of Arbroath CC when even on a seemingly pleasant day the chance of frostbite was always there. The one thing that all of these past experiences have had in common is that they have all taken place in mid April in pre season friendlies when one expects temperatures to plummet and bad weather to prevail. But here we are in mid May when the expectation is that the mercury rises, things become more pleasant and the need for extra jumpers has passed.

However, last Sunday had to be the worst conditions ever seen for a game of cricket at Forthill. The wind was of the gale force variety throughout the whole proceedings; and was strong enough at varying intervals to blow over three of the four sightscreens at the ground. The bowlers all struggled manfully to run in on a straight line and even more manfully to keep the ball going in a straight line towards the wickets. Thankfully both sides showed some lenience in the giving of wides department. The bails blew off so often that it was eventually agreed to dispense with them or else the game would never have finished. Players struggled to keep their feet at times - and in one bizarre incident the ball went up in the air for a potential catch and the fielder got into what he thought was the right position - only for the ball to be blown back towards the batter and land safely some ten yards away from the fielder……
So hats off to the 22 brave souls of Forthill 2nd XI and Kinloch who showed so much commitment on a truly horrendous day and ended up playing out a game of cricket.

With his father absent due to attending a Zumbathon in Great Yarmouth, it was vice skipper Stevie Sim who led the troops on his first appearance of the year for this particular eleven. He won the toss and chose to bowl first on a very damp looking track that had yielded very few runs in the previous day’s fixture. His laces were untied throughout.

Craig and Jumping Jingles opened the bowling and bowled quite well and Craig accounted for visiting skipper Dyer. The ball went past the bat a few times and a few aerial shots narrowly missed going to hand as Bilal and Mahendra played some expansive shots. They both rode their luck and the scoreboard was ticking along alarmingly from a home perspective. Scott G was drafted in to make up the numbers on Sunday morning due to a very late call off and he came on along with Glenn as Chubbsy rang the changes. This did little to stem the flow of runs however and the shot making allied to some potentially suicidal but effective running between the wickets saw the run rate climb…

The wind was horrendous and the home side found themselves chasing leather as Bilal in particular started to play some very expansive shots. Various catches were put down and Chubbsy missed a hat trick of stumping chances in quick succession - and on the basis of this display Zumba man seems set to get the gloves back no problem from his son next week. Chris and Christian were introduced to try and stem the flow of runs - but in what at times resembled an IPL game( complete with coloured clothing and coloured shoes) a succession of Kinloch’s Asian recruits came in one by one and teed of from the first ball and flayed the ball to all parts of the ground. The Forthill youngsters visibly wilted under the onslaught and Bilal completed a fine century and ultimately ended up on 127 not out when the innings closed with Kinloch posting a mammoth 291 for 5. The homesters stuck to the task and could take solace from the fact that no one got blown away, no fallen trees crushed anyone’s limbs, no one was at long on when the sightscreens blew over and no one had to go to Ninewells with frostbite.

Tea was taken within the welcome warmth of the pavilion and the score updates from the Barclays Premier League took the mind of things for a while. Hot tea was poured on hands and feet and the assorted sandwiches and cakes were devoured in a 6 out of 10 standard Forthill 2nd XI tea offering.
The home team discussed tactics at the tea table and self appointed coach Ian seemed happy to add his worth to the tactical conversation by telling us we would get a point if we collectively reached 50…. It seemed that he had little confidence in us knocking off the 292 required to secure 25 points…..

Scott and Craig opened up against the pace of veteran opening bowler Bowman and Mudasaf who belied his natty cream and grey trouser/hoody/backwards cap combo by bowling a tight and nippy spell. The two batters started encouragingly before Scott holed out at point and Clark joined Craig. The hoodster nipped one back substantially to Craig and took his leg stump and Finbar on season’s debut came in. This partnership seemed to hold the last hope of an unlikely assault on the score but disaster struck when Finbar was run out with a direct hit from the boundary and that was that really. Clark clubbed a few runs against his bogey team and the Kinloch boys were surprised to see him getting past double figures against them for the first time in living memory. Apart from a fine and entertaining cameo from Abdullah at the end (32 not out and had clearly also been watching IPL) which included some lusty blows there was little else to write home about as the home side were all out for 169 in the 39th over.

Everyone was happy to see the game brought to a conclusion and the sanctuary of a warm dressing room was happily reached by all. Normally a game at Forthill that sees in excess of 450 runs scored, no rain interruptions and is played in a sporting manner without controversy such as this one – always goes down as a pleasant experience….. But this was not a normal day. The 22 brave and hardy men who lasted the course will forever I am sure remember this one. For this correspondent in the twilight of his playing career, it had me questioning my sanity on more than one occasion and as the football results filtered through and the excitement that had unfolded at Maine Road became apparent (I know it is not Maine Road any more but I always think of Maine Road when talking Man City…) I thought of how I could have been sitting in my house with my tea on a tray watching the footie rather than standing freezing my backside off at Forthill……Insane? Probably

But I guess that is why we play cricket? For the love of the game (really?), the camaraderie and of course the stories…. The story from this game will always be - do you remember the day in May 2012 when we played Kinloch and three of the sightscreens blew over???

So congratulations to Kinloch. No doubt there will be some days when their attacking batting style might not come off – but with a good, experienced bowling attack in their locker as well I am sure they will be in the upper reaches of the division come September. As for the young home side – again there was plenty of encouragement to take out of this. The teenage bowling attack (not including Jingles of course) will have learned from bowling to opposition like this and once again the virtues of line and length at all times came to the fore. No doubt once the dreaded exams are completed and more time can be devoted to practice (and if it ever stops raining on Tuesday nights…) then more accuracy will definitely be discovered. Hopefully the coaches the club has employed will also help these youngsters with the specific help needed to fine tune their game…..!!!

From a batting perspective a total of 170 plus on a damp track against a good attack was not too shabby - and hopefully we can start to post totals of up towards 200 that will give us every chance of winning games. So all in all - this was an amazing feat of skill and endurance from both teams in truly horrendous conditions. The home Man of the Match Award went to Abdullah for his fine innings towards the end of the game and he receives some taxi vouchers from match sponsors Tele Taxis.

Let’s hope that the weather improves in the coming week and next week’s trip to Rossie Priory is played out on a hard deck with a quick outfield under sunny skies………and we might get a nice tea as well!!!!

Kinloch Batting

Player name		Runs
extras TOTAL :	9nb 21w 4b 2lb for 5 wickets	36 291 (45.0 overs)
B Shakir	Not Out	127
R Dyer	ct Welsh b McConnachie	3
Kartik	b Welsh	59
A Gupta	st Sim b Galloway	0
K Khan	b Robertson	22
S Mainigi	lbw McConnachie	23
A Mudasaf	Not Out	14

Forfarshire Cricket Club 3rd XI Bowling

Player Name	Overs	Runs	Wickets	Average	Economy
Craig McConnachie	8.0	54	2	27.00	6.75
Jim Inglis	7.0	23	0	0.00	3.29
Glenn Carnegie	4.0	29	0	0.00	7.25
Scott Galloway	9.0	50	1	50.00	5.56
Christopher Welsh	8.0	40	1	40.00	5.00
Christian Robertson	4.0	45	1	45.00	11.25
Abdullah Awan	5.0	44	0	0.00	8.80

Forfarshire Cricket Club 3rd XI Batting

Player Name		R	4s	6s	Catches	Stumpings
extras TOTAL :	3nb 9w 7b 3lb for 10 wickets	22 168
Scott Galloway	ct Mudasaf	16	2
Craig McConnachie	b Mudasaf	8
Clark McConnachie	ct & b Shakir	66	6	2
John Findlay	Run out	0
Glenn Carnegie	lbw Shakir	8
Christopher Welsh	ct b Shakir	0			1
Steven Sim	b Khan	0				1
Ross Lloyd	b Khan	5
Christian Robertson	ct b Dyer	11	1
Abdullah Awan	Not Out	32	1
Jim Inglis	Run out	0