ICC - The Mighthy Ightham (cont.)

ICC. Here is the pav. It is over a hundred years old, made of wood and if it ever catches fire, a deathtrap. 

Right where was I. Ah yes.

Pete Fryer aka Pete: Yes, we simply have no nickname for Pete. 'Deep fat' might work. Though when the nickname is roughly the same length as the actual name it defeats the point a bit:
A stalwart of the club where, apart from a 4 year sojourn to France where they don't play cricket (Typical French) Pete has been gracing the squad for many years. A versatile player he can bat at any number in the lineup with equal effectiveness. ie 20-24 runs in under 18 deliveries and then he gets caught down at third man (for non-cricketers 'third man' is a place on the field where the ball rarely comes and as such is a place greatly desired by the less athletic cricketers, especially if it is a) in the shade b) near the toilets c) near the cakes or d) near a seat).
He can also be relied upon to bowl occasionally with similar results. ie 20-24 runs in under 18 deliveries. That's right. In a game in which he is called upon to bowl, he more or less cancels himself out.
Fielding is very Ighthamesque. In other words Pete puts on a display of fielding that varies wildly between brilliant, shin-sacrificially dangerous and hilarious.
But it is to his batting we must now turn. Pete finds it impossible to hit the ball anywhere but down to third man. His wagon wheel (I sense I have lost my one American reader - don't worry. I'll be ranting about wheelie bags again soon) only has one spoke. A very thin one that extends behind him and to the left a bit.
Which explains his consistent batting scores. How so? Well it usually takes the opposition captain about 3 overs (there's the 18 balls) to realise that no matter what they bowl to him and no matter where he aims to hit it, the ball will fly in a lazy arc to the third man boundary where, due to its completely unexpected arrival, it will trickle over the boundary for four. At which point he usually sends all but the two of his players who can actually catch, off for a cup of tea. Then puts those two next to each other down at third man where one of them invariably catches him next ball.
In this Pete is the batting equivalent of the bee.
How? Physicists have determined that, aerodynamically, it is impossible for a bee to fly. Yet fly it does ( I know this because I was overtaken by an airborne one when I was out on my bicycle last summer).
Similarly physicists have determined that some particularly wide leg side deliveries are impossible to hit to third man without dislocating one's spinal column. Yet Pete does it with the ease of the master. And they're not all off the edge either. Many is the fast in swinging yorker aimed at leg stump we have seen Pete dispatch nonchalantly to third man OFF THE MIDDLE OF THE BAT.
These so-called physicists have deduced that just before the bat makes contact with the ball at the point in his shot when Pete usually shuts his eyes, his bat achieves light speed, slips through a tear in the very fabric of time itself, jumps the event horizon, picks up some Higgs Bosons near the handle end and shifts the fucking leather down to third man.
Pete Fryer. Cricketer. Man. Bee.