11 July Fulmer (Home) Won by 46 runs

It's amazing to think that we're into mid July and this is only our second home game of the season - damn, I've missed those vandals.....

Just to make a nice change, we lost the 10th toss on the spin and put into bat on what looked to be a fairly bowler friendly pitch. I'm sure that both opening bowlers were fighting to see who got the "easy" end....At 1-2 I'm sure the opposition skipper was rubbing his hands together and looking forward to an early trip back to the Fulmer club house. Fortunately the late arrival of Roll On meant that we didn't have to wait 30 minutes for the next run to be scored as Stanners went in at number 4 and was able to steady the ship with Fat Bloke by putting on 29 for the 3rd wicket. Roll On came and went in a 28 minute, 1 run flash before the new terraces favourite, Frank Skinner, came in and despatched the ball to all corners of the ground in a record breaking 5th wicket partnership of 91 with Mr Bunter. He played some fantastic shots in his 57 including a classical cover drive where he was facing the umpire.....the square leg umpire.

Fat Bloke went about his business in his usual workman like way (i.e. had his arse showing, a copy of the Sun hanging out his back pocket and was always on a tea break) before swinging at a straight one. Dave came, saw and was conquered before Bird Brain Crow took his middle and leg guard, stood a foot outside leg stump and thrashed at the ball entertaingingly for a few runs before Mr V and the new Iver Heath pinch hitter, Stick, finished the innings off.

Chasing 166 to win, Fulmer got off to a flyer with a 4 off the first ball but Stanners hit back with 2 wickets with his next 2 deliveries meaning the score was 4-2 after 3 balls. Who said cricket was a dull game ? Wharton followed up his 3-19 with a hard hitting 55 including a big 6 off Mr V but he found that his colleagues were finding the Iver pitch a little harder to play as wickets fell around him to the guile of Stanners and the raw pace of the Strawberry Blond Assasin.....hehehe. Mr V bowled with control and was unlucky to only end up with 2 wickets but the bowling performance of Stanners was straight out of the top drawer of the filing cabinet marked "Top Drawer Bowling Performances".

The fielding performance was better this week with us only dropping 3 catches (?!?!?) with the highlight being Mr V chasing a ball at fine leg with a pint glass in his hand, collecting the ball and throwing right over the stumps without spilling a drop. Now that is class......

On another day Stanners bowling would have secured the MOM award but the new boy got it by scoring the runs to win us the match (our first ever win against Fulmer) - the rest of us batsmen had better take note !

Man of the Match : Paul Taylor (Frank Skinner) - 88 points