Modesty prevents me profiling myself, except to say that I'm the wicket keeper. As such I get to wear gloves and thick pads on my legs. Which is very useful in the chill of a British summer such as we are experiencing right now. And so we move on to the next in the line up....
Joe: Joe has only been in the team for a year and as such has yet to acquire a nickname though he has, using a natural flair and by doing the opposite of what we advise him, acquired something of a reputation with the ladies.
Joe is only 16 or 17 (not sure). But it doesn't matter. Suffice to say he brings down the average age, not to mention average weight, of the team significantly. Joe had never partaken in the noble art of cricket before the late summer of 2011. Hard as it is to imagine, the character building humiliations of the game of cricket have been completely absent from this whippersnapper's life experiences. No more. Now he has joined the ranks of Ightham CC, his proper education can begin. Each fixture, not just a game of cricket, but a grounding in life and how to live it. If he is wise he will listen, absorb and learn from the non-stop out-pouring of ill-formed opinions, hare-brained theories, hilarious nonsense and irrelevant observations about the other team and become, not just a noble cricketing warrior, but a man. A man with stupid theories, an eye for a cake, a complete lack of cricketing technique and an almighty thirst it goes without saying but a man nonetheless.
What better time to turn to Joe's cricketing technique?
Joe is an all rounder in that he hasn't played long enough to know if he's a batter or a bowler or neither, like the rest of us. Sadly for me he hasn't shown any great desire to don the gloves of honour and pads of duty and learn the art of glovemanship (wicket keeping). And judging by the throwing skills on display so far this season, he's very wise.
Having never been taught how to bat or bowl in his formative years, Joe's techniques are unhindered by centuries of learning and he bats bowls and fields in a refreshingly abstract way. Whereas batters like Moodos, bowlers like Millsy and fielders like Pete Fryer have thrown away the rule book, Joe never knew there was one. And it's to his credit.
When bowling he is impossible to bat against because everyone who faces him has been brought up in the traditional way. How to play each type of delivery has been drummed into them since first they picked up a bat. The trouble with this is that when Joe bowls a delivery that has never been seen before in the entire history of cricket, they are unequipped with the appropriate shot to play it.
For example we've all faced a Yorker before. It's fast, flat and pitched so that it bounces just in front of the batsman's feet. So we jam the bat down as quick as we can, shut our eyes (it goes without saying) and hop in the air like a frightened deer. Not so a Joe Yorker. No textbook has yet been written on how to deal with the one I witnessed last year.
Counter-intuitively this Yorker was neither fast nor flat. It was indeed very slow and very high. It was the highest delivery I've ever seen. On delivery it went almost vertically in the air. Almost. It had enough of an angle on it for it to have some forward momentum. It's high, arcing parabola conveniently took it EXACTLY the same distance as a cricket pitch.
In other words the batsman found it dropping vertically on the top of his head.
What does one do? Getting the foot to the pitch of the ball is irrelevant for it is about to pitch on your head. Watching the ball onto the bat is impossible without resting the bat on your eyes. This was going to be interesting, I mused as I retired a few steps in order to enjoy the fun.
In the end the batsman chose to do this:
He hopped about from one foot to the other, shouted "Fuck!" swished at it as one might swish at a angry wasp (ie swishing like fuckerio), alarm the wicket keeper, kick at it, take cover and finally, simply twirl round and round on the spot hoping the ball might hit his bat.
Luck was with him. Miraculously making contact with neither his cranium nor bat, the ball didn't have enough momentum to knock the bails off.
Joe's batting however is textbook. If the textbook is entitled "How to bat the Ightham way."
You know the technique pretty well by now but I'll tell you the essentials once again.
Eyes: Shut.
Bat: Aimed like a warhammer.
Foot placement: Who cares?
Balance: For sissies.
Concentration: Nice to have but a bit of a luxury.
Soundtrack playing in one's head "The Ride of the Valkyries" by Wagner.
Which leaves nothing more to do than emit an audible shriek as the bat is deployed at Warp speed and then the slow trudge back to the pav with the bat tucked under one arm as the umpire attempts to reassemble the scattered remnants of what were once a nice orderly set of stumps.
Batter. Bowler. We simply don't know.
Monday, 13 May 2013
Thursday, 28 March 2013
Mighthy Ightham (the profiles continue)
And so we come to the 2nd most important member of the team.
Richard Bridge AKA Bridgey, Skip, The Silver Fox. (If I need to explain the first one, you've clearly been fortunate enough never to have read this blog before. In which case, leave. Leave now while your faith in humanity remains intact.
Why Skip, I hear you ask? Well anyone who's played sport will know it's because he is our Captain or Skipper. In other words, our leader, our man at the helm, our wise old owl who leads from the front waving his bat like a mighty sword, who plots the downfall of our enemies, inspires his troops, finds out where the fuck Joe Austin's gone, prises a match fee out of Benwell, swears loudly in despair and who, late at night, when we've just been beaten by the 8 men, 2 children and a dog that make up the Falconhurst CC 1st XI, looks to the heavens and quietly implores God "Why me?" Bridgey has been skipper for over 8 years.
Silver Fox is a nickname Bridgey himself is trying, unsuccessfully to insert into the team's vocabulary on account of his prematurely grey hair. He thinks it imbues him with a certain sophisticated, savoir faire. Anyone who has been present at one of our "team bonding sessions" at The Old Red Lion in Holborn or in the changing room when he releases one of his infamous "squeakers" will know that it will take more than a few grey hairs to achieve this. Needless to say only Bridgey calls Bridgey The Silver Fox.)
The man who must take the raw materials described in previous posts (us) and with a magic alchemy worthy of Merlin himself, mould them into a tightly-knit, ruthless team of athletic gods. An impossible task?
Completely.
Sometimes though, he manages to arrange events in such a way that a motley collection of loafers, dandies, cretins, drunks, cripples, pensioners, teenagers and fatsos all turn up at the same ground, at the same time, with the intention of either playing a game of cricket or eating cakes (it doesn't matter which, for to achieve one, it is more or less mandatory to achieve the other) who are as capable of genius as they are of laughable ignominy. Often in the same game. What am I talking about? Often in the same over.
The frustrating thing for Bridgey is that it's impossible to know which. Which goes some way to explaining his grey hair.
Though he is by nature a kindly soul and a philosophical Captain, his temper may flare up occasionally and many is the picturesque, quintessential village green, nestled deep in the glorious Kent countryside, surrounded by pretty thatched cottages, perhaps a Norman church over yonder and little old ladies making cucumber sandwiches, that has echoed to the cry of "FOR FUCK'S SAKE!"
He is though, a magnanimous opponent and only slags off the opposition behind their backs. As exemplified by his stirring words upon being beaten by well known bellends, Shipbourne CC 1XI, and I quote "We'll clap them off, call them cunts and go for a pint." I put it to you my one reader, that even the Cambridge educated, ex-England skipper, writer and phsycoanalyst, Mike Brearly could not have encapsulated the Art of Captaincy so eruditely.
Anyway. It is to his cricketing skills that we must now turn. Bridgey is a very capable all rounder - which for my one American reader (howdy pardner) means he can bat, bowl and field to a good standard. Normally a cricketer excels in one, two or (surprisingly frequently) none of these disciplines but rarely do they excel in all three. Bridgey is one such freak.
Bowling - Though a very respectable bowler he is reluctant to put himself on to bowl until the crap batsmen are in (one of the perks of being the Captain), whereupon he will greedily despatch the old, the young and the infirm who tend to occupy the lower batting order, as efficiently as a dose of Swine Flu.
Batting - 'Pon being called on to bat Bridgey will belabour the ball happily to all corners of the ground with a combination of textbook cover drives, sublime cuts, pulls and almighty, cross-batted, eyes-shut, trouser-rending heaves down to cow corner, not to mention the textbook, Ightham-patented shot in which one thwacks it with an impeccable timing usually completely absent from the rest of the innngs, really hard into one's own foot from where it cannons of the ankle with a sickening crunch and dribbles out somewhere between square leg and mid-wicket at such a slow pace one can easily hobble a "quick" single. While crying.
Fielding - A reliably safe pair of hands Bridgey rarely drops a catch. Of late though his usually, equally reliable ground fielding has developed what can only be described as irony. How the hell can that happen? Well it goes like this. One of us will temporarily allow our admittedly pretty mediocre standards of fielding to slip yet further and either drop a catch, let a 4 through our legs or simply fall over. This is usually accompanied by hoots of derision, the tinkle of light laughter from the rest of the team and, by now his catchphrase, a "For Fuck's Sake!" from Bridgey. Sometimes this mistake will elicit a shout from Bridgey for us to tighten it up in the field a bit boys. Irony then kicks in.Within two deliveries the ball will be hit smartly to Bridgey and he will miss it. Balance s now restored to the universe.
For a summation of Bridgey's contribution to Ightham cricket we must go back in time to a late summer evening after a match in which we managed to scrape a win and in doing so, avoid relegation to Div 3 (where all the knobs end up - snigger). Ensconced in the George and Dragon and the loving embrace of 5 pints of cooking lager the team was looking wistfully back at the season's ups and downs. That's right. We were taking the piss out of each other. With great dignity Bridgey bore the good-natured attacks on his honour until he could bear it no more. With the wisdom of Plato and the eloquence of Stephen Fry (though not the sexual orientation), he said,
"At least I've managed to keep you bastards in Div 2 for 6 years."
Which is truly not the work of a mortal. It is the work of a magician.
Bridgey. Philosopher. Sufferer of fools gladly. Paul Daniels.
Richard Bridge AKA Bridgey, Skip, The Silver Fox. (If I need to explain the first one, you've clearly been fortunate enough never to have read this blog before. In which case, leave. Leave now while your faith in humanity remains intact.
Why Skip, I hear you ask? Well anyone who's played sport will know it's because he is our Captain or Skipper. In other words, our leader, our man at the helm, our wise old owl who leads from the front waving his bat like a mighty sword, who plots the downfall of our enemies, inspires his troops, finds out where the fuck Joe Austin's gone, prises a match fee out of Benwell, swears loudly in despair and who, late at night, when we've just been beaten by the 8 men, 2 children and a dog that make up the Falconhurst CC 1st XI, looks to the heavens and quietly implores God "Why me?" Bridgey has been skipper for over 8 years.
Silver Fox is a nickname Bridgey himself is trying, unsuccessfully to insert into the team's vocabulary on account of his prematurely grey hair. He thinks it imbues him with a certain sophisticated, savoir faire. Anyone who has been present at one of our "team bonding sessions" at The Old Red Lion in Holborn or in the changing room when he releases one of his infamous "squeakers" will know that it will take more than a few grey hairs to achieve this. Needless to say only Bridgey calls Bridgey The Silver Fox.)
The man who must take the raw materials described in previous posts (us) and with a magic alchemy worthy of Merlin himself, mould them into a tightly-knit, ruthless team of athletic gods. An impossible task?
Completely.
Sometimes though, he manages to arrange events in such a way that a motley collection of loafers, dandies, cretins, drunks, cripples, pensioners, teenagers and fatsos all turn up at the same ground, at the same time, with the intention of either playing a game of cricket or eating cakes (it doesn't matter which, for to achieve one, it is more or less mandatory to achieve the other) who are as capable of genius as they are of laughable ignominy. Often in the same game. What am I talking about? Often in the same over.
The frustrating thing for Bridgey is that it's impossible to know which. Which goes some way to explaining his grey hair.
Though he is by nature a kindly soul and a philosophical Captain, his temper may flare up occasionally and many is the picturesque, quintessential village green, nestled deep in the glorious Kent countryside, surrounded by pretty thatched cottages, perhaps a Norman church over yonder and little old ladies making cucumber sandwiches, that has echoed to the cry of "FOR FUCK'S SAKE!"
He is though, a magnanimous opponent and only slags off the opposition behind their backs. As exemplified by his stirring words upon being beaten by well known bellends, Shipbourne CC 1XI, and I quote "We'll clap them off, call them cunts and go for a pint." I put it to you my one reader, that even the Cambridge educated, ex-England skipper, writer and phsycoanalyst, Mike Brearly could not have encapsulated the Art of Captaincy so eruditely.
Anyway. It is to his cricketing skills that we must now turn. Bridgey is a very capable all rounder - which for my one American reader (howdy pardner) means he can bat, bowl and field to a good standard. Normally a cricketer excels in one, two or (surprisingly frequently) none of these disciplines but rarely do they excel in all three. Bridgey is one such freak.
Bowling - Though a very respectable bowler he is reluctant to put himself on to bowl until the crap batsmen are in (one of the perks of being the Captain), whereupon he will greedily despatch the old, the young and the infirm who tend to occupy the lower batting order, as efficiently as a dose of Swine Flu.
Batting - 'Pon being called on to bat Bridgey will belabour the ball happily to all corners of the ground with a combination of textbook cover drives, sublime cuts, pulls and almighty, cross-batted, eyes-shut, trouser-rending heaves down to cow corner, not to mention the textbook, Ightham-patented shot in which one thwacks it with an impeccable timing usually completely absent from the rest of the innngs, really hard into one's own foot from where it cannons of the ankle with a sickening crunch and dribbles out somewhere between square leg and mid-wicket at such a slow pace one can easily hobble a "quick" single. While crying.
Fielding - A reliably safe pair of hands Bridgey rarely drops a catch. Of late though his usually, equally reliable ground fielding has developed what can only be described as irony. How the hell can that happen? Well it goes like this. One of us will temporarily allow our admittedly pretty mediocre standards of fielding to slip yet further and either drop a catch, let a 4 through our legs or simply fall over. This is usually accompanied by hoots of derision, the tinkle of light laughter from the rest of the team and, by now his catchphrase, a "For Fuck's Sake!" from Bridgey. Sometimes this mistake will elicit a shout from Bridgey for us to tighten it up in the field a bit boys. Irony then kicks in.Within two deliveries the ball will be hit smartly to Bridgey and he will miss it. Balance s now restored to the universe.
For a summation of Bridgey's contribution to Ightham cricket we must go back in time to a late summer evening after a match in which we managed to scrape a win and in doing so, avoid relegation to Div 3 (where all the knobs end up - snigger). Ensconced in the George and Dragon and the loving embrace of 5 pints of cooking lager the team was looking wistfully back at the season's ups and downs. That's right. We were taking the piss out of each other. With great dignity Bridgey bore the good-natured attacks on his honour until he could bear it no more. With the wisdom of Plato and the eloquence of Stephen Fry (though not the sexual orientation), he said,
"At least I've managed to keep you bastards in Div 2 for 6 years."
Which is truly not the work of a mortal. It is the work of a magician.
Bridgey. Philosopher. Sufferer of fools gladly. Paul Daniels.
Tuesday, 5 February 2013
Mighthy Ightham (cont. again)
Right who's next? Ahhh.
Andy Moodie AKA Moodos, Moods: (No need for explanation on this one. But I'm going to do it anyway. His real name has the" y" sound on the end already so we can't put another one on. We've tried.)
Over the years Moodos has probably been our most prolific run scorer. Many is the twelve year old, would-be England bowler who has had his little spirits crushed by Moodos smiting every ball into various parts of Kent, Surrey and Sussex (East and West) and, on one memorable occasion, France. ("Oi Monsieur Pantalon,voulez-vous donnez notre ballon back. Do not worryer. Vous are not being invaded - no need to run away encore.")
Oh yes. Moodos is a master practioner of what the Olympic Commitee now recognise as a martial art. It is entitled "Batting - Ightham style." It's a unique style, or tao if you will, that has evolved over the 200 odd years the club has existed. I'll try to summerise it here. It starts at 5:30PMish the day before the game with essential mental preparation:
1. Get royally arseholed with Benwell/Leggett until about 4AM on the day of the game.
2: Rest.
3: Roughly an hour and 10 mins before the game starts, set off on the hour and a half journey to the ground.
4: Stop at a garage for breakfast. Tuna sandwich (or whatever they have left), Peperami, Lucozade, fags, crisps are the essential food groups our Batting Master requires to operate at peak athleticism.
5: Arrive at ground. Apologise to skip.
6: Change into traditional robes (nylon trousers and two sizes too small shirt).
7: Traditional war cries from one's fellow warriors ring in the ears of our Master as he dons his armour, such as "Hurry up Moodos, you look like shit!"
8: Before long, take up the bat like a warhammer, emerge into the light blinking like a mole and to hoots of derision, bestride the sward, towards the field of battle.
9: If everything has gone according to plan, the nasty fast bowlers will have commenced their rest and the Master will be faced with an elderly spinner, a 12 year old spinner, a seamer with a dodgy back, a 16 year old fast bowler (all pace, testosterone, anger and no common sense), a guileful trundler or someone's mate who turned up at the last minute and said he used to bowl at school.
What am I talking about? It doesn't matter who bowls the first ball at him. It could be Richard III, Michael Holding, the Queen, Zeus, Dale Steyn or a mouse. Literally whatever, however and whoever bowls the first ball, the Master will aim to hit it so hard, it evaporates into ball vapour. Direction - irrelevant. Shot selection - irrelevant. Feet Placement - Laughably irrelevant. Balance - Unrequired. Altitude - Irrelevant. Sutting of the eyes - Essential. Might of swipe - Everything.
The innings will now take one of two directions.
Direction 1: Stumps shattered - The Master walks back to the pav to advise the novice monk/batsmen where they are going wrong.
Direction 2: The ball goes for a 6. The Master will then take 12 balls to score 147, go a shade of red unseen in the human species, achieve a temperature of 3000 degrees Kelvin and become, from that moment onwards, unable to bowl, field, catch or do anything more strenuous than eat cakes, stand, mock, sit, look at things (as long as they're not too bright) and breathe.
Moodos. Drinker. Bon Viveur. Masterbatter.
Andy Moodie AKA Moodos, Moods: (No need for explanation on this one. But I'm going to do it anyway. His real name has the" y" sound on the end already so we can't put another one on. We've tried.)
Over the years Moodos has probably been our most prolific run scorer. Many is the twelve year old, would-be England bowler who has had his little spirits crushed by Moodos smiting every ball into various parts of Kent, Surrey and Sussex (East and West) and, on one memorable occasion, France. ("Oi Monsieur Pantalon,voulez-vous donnez notre ballon back. Do not worryer. Vous are not being invaded - no need to run away encore.")
Oh yes. Moodos is a master practioner of what the Olympic Commitee now recognise as a martial art. It is entitled "Batting - Ightham style." It's a unique style, or tao if you will, that has evolved over the 200 odd years the club has existed. I'll try to summerise it here. It starts at 5:30PMish the day before the game with essential mental preparation:
1. Get royally arseholed with Benwell/Leggett until about 4AM on the day of the game.
2: Rest.
3: Roughly an hour and 10 mins before the game starts, set off on the hour and a half journey to the ground.
4: Stop at a garage for breakfast. Tuna sandwich (or whatever they have left), Peperami, Lucozade, fags, crisps are the essential food groups our Batting Master requires to operate at peak athleticism.
5: Arrive at ground. Apologise to skip.
6: Change into traditional robes (nylon trousers and two sizes too small shirt).
7: Traditional war cries from one's fellow warriors ring in the ears of our Master as he dons his armour, such as "Hurry up Moodos, you look like shit!"
8: Before long, take up the bat like a warhammer, emerge into the light blinking like a mole and to hoots of derision, bestride the sward, towards the field of battle.
9: If everything has gone according to plan, the nasty fast bowlers will have commenced their rest and the Master will be faced with an elderly spinner, a 12 year old spinner, a seamer with a dodgy back, a 16 year old fast bowler (all pace, testosterone, anger and no common sense), a guileful trundler or someone's mate who turned up at the last minute and said he used to bowl at school.
What am I talking about? It doesn't matter who bowls the first ball at him. It could be Richard III, Michael Holding, the Queen, Zeus, Dale Steyn or a mouse. Literally whatever, however and whoever bowls the first ball, the Master will aim to hit it so hard, it evaporates into ball vapour. Direction - irrelevant. Shot selection - irrelevant. Feet Placement - Laughably irrelevant. Balance - Unrequired. Altitude - Irrelevant. Sutting of the eyes - Essential. Might of swipe - Everything.
The innings will now take one of two directions.
Direction 1: Stumps shattered - The Master walks back to the pav to advise the novice monk/batsmen where they are going wrong.
Direction 2: The ball goes for a 6. The Master will then take 12 balls to score 147, go a shade of red unseen in the human species, achieve a temperature of 3000 degrees Kelvin and become, from that moment onwards, unable to bowl, field, catch or do anything more strenuous than eat cakes, stand, mock, sit, look at things (as long as they're not too bright) and breathe.
Moodos. Drinker. Bon Viveur. Masterbatter.
Where the hell have I been!?
It's the usual excuse. Work. When someone acquires the muddleheaded opinion that I might have a clue what I'm doing, they will occasionally offer me financially remunerated work. And so it behoves me to down blogging tools (a computer, cup of coffee, a furrowed brow, a look that tries to suggest cleverness to the casual onlooker) and just bloody well get on with it for fuck's sake.
My other excuse is tonsillitis. I have just suffered my first, and I hope last, dose of tonillitis. A disease, I previously thought of as the disease of sickly 14 year olds.
It goes like this.
Stage 1: Flu + Sweating
Stage 2: Flu gets better but you get a 'sore throat.'
Stage 3: The 'sore throat' becomes a 'seriously fucking painful. No really, I'm not joking. Seriously fucking painful' throat.
Stage 4: You can't sleep.
Stage 5: You see the doc who laughs at the size of your tonsil which is now a fat, bloated slug, covered in white slime, lying, not tucked away at the back of your throat, no, it's moved out, it's now just in your mouth. You can see it. You can see the veins in it.
Stage 6: You take penicillin.
Stage 7: Gradually it stops hurting, you stop sweating.
Stage 8: Health!
I am somewhere between 7 and 8. Sometime during Stage 5 it can develop into Glandular Fever which is exactly the same as Tonsillitis with the addition of liver problems. Turns out my liver's fucked anyway so it's not that worrying
My other excuse is tonsillitis. I have just suffered my first, and I hope last, dose of tonillitis. A disease, I previously thought of as the disease of sickly 14 year olds.
It goes like this.
Stage 1: Flu + Sweating
Stage 2: Flu gets better but you get a 'sore throat.'
Stage 3: The 'sore throat' becomes a 'seriously fucking painful. No really, I'm not joking. Seriously fucking painful' throat.
Stage 4: You can't sleep.
Stage 5: You see the doc who laughs at the size of your tonsil which is now a fat, bloated slug, covered in white slime, lying, not tucked away at the back of your throat, no, it's moved out, it's now just in your mouth. You can see it. You can see the veins in it.
Stage 6: You take penicillin.
Stage 7: Gradually it stops hurting, you stop sweating.
Stage 8: Health!
I am somewhere between 7 and 8. Sometime during Stage 5 it can develop into Glandular Fever which is exactly the same as Tonsillitis with the addition of liver problems. Turns out my liver's fucked anyway so it's not that worrying
Wednesday, 31 October 2012
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. |
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.
Wednesday, 3 October 2012
ICC - The Mighthy Ightham
During the summer, such as the one just gone, I play cricket for a small village in Kent (England's doorknob - located at the extreme bottom right of our wonderful island) called Ightham. Why is it spelled funny? No idea. Anyway here is our logo (designed by my own fair hand).
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| Note impaled rabbit on the sword. The date at the bottom is possibly inaccurate as I simply made it up. |
And here is a photo of the Sunday team that was putting on a display of textbook cricket last Sunday (As long as the textbook is entitled "How to be shit at cricket.").
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| Left to right. Top row : Howard Mills, Matt Leggett, Steve Dawes, Sean Ashfield, Pete Fryer. Seated: Andy Moodie, Richard Bridge, Me. Front row: Joe Adam, Joe Austin, Tom Bentall. |
Here's a lowdown of the team in picture order:
Howard Mills: AKA Millsy (Nickname arrived at by using the highly imaginative British expedient of adding a "y" on to the end of someone's name. :
Infamous throughout the length and breadth of the Kent Village Cricket League Div 2 for his hilarious bowling run up. It all starts smoothly then when he nears his delivery stride he embarks on a frankly bizarre series of very small, very fast steps. What would take a boringly traditional bowler one medium to medium/large stride can take Millsy as many as twenty six tiny little steps, his feet a positive blur. It all makes for marvellous entertainment for the batsman and wicket keeper (usually me) as we wonder when, if ever, the ball will be launched towards us. Two or three times a season the steps get so small that forward progress can be only be measured in microns and it dawns on him that at this speed it will take three weeks to reach the delivery stride. Thankfully, in these instances he gives up altogether and starts again. Known as a refusal. The groundsman is delighted as the top end gets a good scarifying from Millsy's boots.
Matt Leggett: AKA Leggett (but pronounced as if you are French. No one knows why):
Remarkable for only ever catching difficult catches. Matt inspires much mirth in his teamates (and a sweary despair in his skipper) by finding ever more comical ways to drop easy catches that my Mum could take, followed by open-mouthed dumbfoundedness when he holds onto ones that would test a professional. There's no explaining it. You just accept it.
Matt uses the little known (outside Ightham) "Confusion" method of bowling. ie the first 5 balls in an over will be a motley collection of wides, no balls, aerial wides, double bouncers, refusals, beamers and ones that actually bounce on a different pitch to the one we're playing on. Then comes the masterstroke. A straight one. By the time this highly unusual delivery has been brought into play, the batsman (and, indeed, everyone - including Matt) is so confused, the last thing he is expecting is what is known in the trade as "a good ball." It will then either clean bowl the hapless batter or be gently lobbed directly to a fielder who is often so embarrassed they are reluctant to take the catch. But who's the mug we have to ask ourselves? The batsman, that's who.
Steve Dawes: AKA Steve (Mysteriously he isn't known as Back, Front or Patio - again, nobody knows why):
Known as a limpet like opener, Steve gives his wicket away dearly and occupies the crease, doggedly seeing off the shine of the new ball and running out the rest of us willy nilly. He got me this season by confidently shouting "Yes!" at which point I hurtled (a relative term - when hurtling, in reality I achieve a speed only slightly faster than just standing) down the pitch. When I reached halfway down the pitch, only then did Steve perform a risk assessment of this run we had so lightheartedly embarked upon. Sadly for me he assessed it was too risky. He then informed me of this assessment by yelling "No! No! No!" and strolling back to his end. In years gone by I would have stopped on a sixpence and darted back to safety. These days, however, more practical emergency measures must be brought into play.
Now, there was little point in stopping because:
a) Rather like an oil tanker it takes six nautical miles for me to come to a complete standstill.
b) Once halted it takes ages to gather enough momentum to escape the gravitational pull of the earth and achieve forward motion again.
So, while maintaining top speed (again a relative term), I attempted what, in naval circles, would be termed "hard a'starboard." However in real terms, was a long, slow turn of a radius that, if completed, would have taken a full minute to execute and would easily have encompassed the pavilion, the church and some detached housing. The result? Run out by three feet.
Admittedly I nearly got him later on in the season by contrasting, enthusiastically setting off on a run, with confidently shouting "No!" His face was a picture of confusion matched, I suspect, only by my own.
To be continued.....
Sean Ashfield: AKA Shozzer, Wides, The Seanado (to rhyme with Tornado).
Though Sean is a member of Ightham Cricket Club and, indeed, was its Chairman for a few years, he actually plays for Underriver Cricket Club. Eh? He used to play for us and still occasionally does (see picture) but in the all important Kent Village Cricket League Divs 1-6 he prefers to ply his trade for Underriver (currently promoted to Div 4) rather than Ightham (Mid-table mediocrity in Div 2). Why? The seeds of this conundrum lie in notoriously fragile mental makeup of the fast bowler. That's right. Like many members of this elite group of finely tuned athletes Sean is both fragile and mental. How does this manifest itself on the field of honour (cricket pitch)? Wides that's how.
I am the wicket keeper. In the normal run of things a wicket keeper's lot is thankless drudgery, enlivened only by chatting to 1st slip about important topics (who's doing the tea, who's got quite big tits, agreeing that the catch we have just contrived to drop probably didn't carry anyway). So we don't take kindly to bowlers who bowl wides down the leg side. To anyone who isn't au fait with the "Art of wicket keeping" as I like to term it, allow me to explain what you have to do when someone bowls a "wide down the leg side."
1. From the crouched position you have to rise. This happens every time a bowler bowls but you have to get up a bit quicker than normal because, frankly you're going to be busy.
2. Set off for the leg side. Best at this stage to overestimate rather than underestimate just how wide it is going to be by the time it gets to you. You won't regret this.
3. On your journey down the leg side your view will be temporarily obscured by the batsman. In the kind of circles we pay cricket in, players are not renowned for their sleekness of frame. So this blind spot is usually pretty big and consists of two great big fat arse cheeks.
4. Emerge the other side of the batsman and pull away from his gravitational field, hoping vainly that your next view of the delivery will reveal it to be "not too bad."
5. Depending on wideness either dive full length with left arm outstretched hoping to get some glove on it, hurtle after it hoping not only to catch it but be able to arrest your accumulated momentum before you hit the fence, simply catch the bastard.
6. Glare at the bowler.
7. Mutter at the mirthful antics of the rest of the team.
All it takes is for Sean to pop one down the leg and he gets the yips. Then every succeeding delivery follows it. Why don't I just stand down the leg side and wait for it, I hear you not unreasonably ask? Because usually he will over compensate with at least one delivery by bowling a massive wide down the off (the other side to leg) that if I didn't catch, would clunk sickeningly into third slip's kneecap.
Mysteriously this doesn't happen when he plays for Underriver for whom he bowls very well and is the terror of the tail, intimidating 14 year olds, OAPs, and the blind with spells of devastating fast (relative to a bee in flight) bowling.
Wednesday, 26 September 2012
Well it's been a long time hasn't it
I haven't blogged for bally ages and literally no one has been demanding that I do. So tough shit. I've done it anyway. Here's a picture I took at Waitrose's.
Textbook stuff.
I'm in Nero's having a coffee and putting off writing my great novel that will make my fortune. My latest ouevre is about a man, much like myself, who.... that's as far as I've got.
I've been back from Shitburg (Hamburg) for one and a half weeks now. Very pleased not to be going there anymore. The work was quite well paid but it was astonishingly badly run. Everyday I was rendered dumbstruck by their antics and I gradually lost the will to live. I started to realise that the skillset I was using wasn't the traditional one for a copywriter (that of writing copy) it was, rather, trying to look like I give a shit. In advertising this is now a very important skillset. Much more important than doing your job.
So what else has been happening?
Me and Liz went to a pub called The Palm Tree in Mile End. It is a throwback to the 1950's and as such, is brilliant and well worth a visit. There was no one in there but for two old couples on one table, one old couple sat at the bar, the barman (old) and me (in comparison, a fresh faced youngster) and Liz. As we sat there a pigeon hopped up the step, strolled in through the front door and walked towards the bar. All of us in the pub obeseved it quietly as it walked in, behaving in exactly the way an underage drinker does when they try to brazen their way into a pub for the first time. The barman shouted "Oi. Out you go, we've got too many birds in 'ere."
The pigeon turned round and walked out.
Made me laugh. Made the old women cackle like crones. The barman was rightly proud of his joke.
What also makes me laugh is the shop downstairs from my flat. It is one of those places women go to have their fannies dewaxed, their eyebrows attacked and their skin stripped from their bodies with a laser centrifuge or something. At day's end they always put a bin bag on the pavement outside the shop. Now I'm no detective inspector, as you know, but my guess would be that the bin bag is full of fanny hair. A big spherical ball of springy, fanny hair contained in a bin bag about the size of a beachball.
Why on earth am I telling you all this? Apart from I just like saying "fanny hair" I am really tempted to kick it. You know how sometimes you want to bite into a cake of soap, not for the taste or anything, but just to experience the sensation on your teeth.
Well I want to kick it to feel the sensation on my foot. If my guess is correct I reckon it would feel really nice and once airborn, would float somewhat, on the breeze, making for a good game of fanny hair ball keepy uppy.
I'll let you know if I do.
In the meantime a few more photos.
 |
| Wrap your lips around them |
Textbook stuff.
I'm in Nero's having a coffee and putting off writing my great novel that will make my fortune. My latest ouevre is about a man, much like myself, who.... that's as far as I've got.
I've been back from Shitburg (Hamburg) for one and a half weeks now. Very pleased not to be going there anymore. The work was quite well paid but it was astonishingly badly run. Everyday I was rendered dumbstruck by their antics and I gradually lost the will to live. I started to realise that the skillset I was using wasn't the traditional one for a copywriter (that of writing copy) it was, rather, trying to look like I give a shit. In advertising this is now a very important skillset. Much more important than doing your job.
So what else has been happening?
Me and Liz went to a pub called The Palm Tree in Mile End. It is a throwback to the 1950's and as such, is brilliant and well worth a visit. There was no one in there but for two old couples on one table, one old couple sat at the bar, the barman (old) and me (in comparison, a fresh faced youngster) and Liz. As we sat there a pigeon hopped up the step, strolled in through the front door and walked towards the bar. All of us in the pub obeseved it quietly as it walked in, behaving in exactly the way an underage drinker does when they try to brazen their way into a pub for the first time. The barman shouted "Oi. Out you go, we've got too many birds in 'ere."
The pigeon turned round and walked out.
Made me laugh. Made the old women cackle like crones. The barman was rightly proud of his joke.
What also makes me laugh is the shop downstairs from my flat. It is one of those places women go to have their fannies dewaxed, their eyebrows attacked and their skin stripped from their bodies with a laser centrifuge or something. At day's end they always put a bin bag on the pavement outside the shop. Now I'm no detective inspector, as you know, but my guess would be that the bin bag is full of fanny hair. A big spherical ball of springy, fanny hair contained in a bin bag about the size of a beachball.
Why on earth am I telling you all this? Apart from I just like saying "fanny hair" I am really tempted to kick it. You know how sometimes you want to bite into a cake of soap, not for the taste or anything, but just to experience the sensation on your teeth.
Well I want to kick it to feel the sensation on my foot. If my guess is correct I reckon it would feel really nice and once airborn, would float somewhat, on the breeze, making for a good game of fanny hair ball keepy uppy.
I'll let you know if I do.
In the meantime a few more photos.
 |
| A magnificant pair of jugs. |
 |
| Me in Nero's with my new contact lenses. They're taking a bit of getting used to. Also check out the new boots. Redwings. Oh yes. Redwings. |
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