The Toos earned a revenge victory over the Schools team by 17 runs on Saturday in what ended up being an interesting 20/20 fixture.

We won the toss and elected to bat. Even before a ball had been bowled I put myself in pole position for COTD with this decision. After one over the pitch had more in common with a marsh mallow than a wicket. Opening the batting, Tommy and Watto decided that the best way to deal with the pitch issue was to tell the umpires that they were total, f***ing idiots and deploy some tactful, Australian diplomacy by walking off. After some heated debate and the umpires playing their joker by phoning a couple of friends, they decided that the pitch was unplayable, that they would roll again and that we would play when it had baked sufficiently.

Needless to say the 3 hour delay significantly improved Schools’ chances of success as there was little else for us to do but send off for more green energy drink and fill our boots. Fortunately Welly’s arrived with food early enough to soak up some of the impending hangovers.

Tommy and Watto resumed their master class, now in marginally better spirit. Inevitably, after unleashing several hours of abuse Tommy’s innings was very short lived. Watto lasted longer. The loss of Tommy and a wound to the chin when sliding his bat doubled Watto’s resolve for abuse and threats of legal action against anyone who would listen which by this stage was only really Nick Robinson. The decision to bat was demoted to second favourite in the race for COTD. 

We batted out our 20 overs for the loss of 9 wickets. The total of 115 was reasonable but by no means out of the youngsters’ reach on a pitch which was improving as the day went on.  Notable batting performances – a hard-working 23 from Watto, 19 fairly quickly from Hugh, 26 from Ledge, including 2 very big sixes, and a virtuoso and entertaining 5 or 6 off a few balls at the death  from a hard hitting Dobby Burges, rolling back the years and looking like Gower in his prime.

In the absence of Big Red Tim Hepburn got the new ball. Seizing his chance, Tim decided that he would emulate the skipper by bowling a first over with a ball count somewhere in the double digits. Tim seemed to have left his mojo in a Vegas dance emporium in the days before the game.

The pitch dictated that it was a day for spin and the introduction of Watto and myself put something of a stranglehold on the game. The Schools’ team lost wickets steadily and couldn’t score runs nearly fast enough. The Greenies’ fielding was also unusually athletic with a couple of impressive outfield catches by Ledge and me. (Note – the only time you are likely to see the words ‘athletic’ and ‘McGrath’ in the same sentence is when I get to write the script.) Ledge and Grover bowled relatively economically towards the end until Hugh Thompson was asked to bowl the last over with Schools requiring about 20. Being the senior pro that he is, Hugh stated that he was up for the task but only so long there was a guarantee that Schools did not have Pearson Best coming in at number 9.  Fortunately they did not and Hugh mopped up the tail claiming 3 wickets in his last over. 

Wicket takers were – McGrath 4, Thompson 3, Watto 1, and one tidy run out from Watto to Tommy, who had a good first outing behind the stumps.

The following daily awards were handed out, accompanied by a vintage Nick Robinson marinade bottle:

COTD – Watto

Play of the Day – Ledge’s catch

MOM – McGrath

The Toos now sit impressively atop Group 2B and the sky’s the limit.