Tame

Yesterday's tea at the field of dreams was influenced by Jimi Hendrix and the Pixies, more on this later.

Didcot's premier side returned to winning ways with a thumping victory over the auld enemy of Thame.

Skipper Gates made his only telling contribution of the day by calling correctly after flipping his lucky coin, and invited the oppo. to have a bat on what looked like a belter of a track. The Field of Dreams looked a picture yesterday, flag flying proudly in the sunshine. It almost brought a lump to my throat as I strode back towards the pavilion.

Early strikes from Matt and Stimpo had Thame at 6 for 2, great start. A mini revival saw Thame limp to 45 for 2 when something remarkable happened. Cookie threw down a slow-medium paced half volley, conveniently outside off stump, nothing remarkable so far. The batsman absolutely creamed it through extra cover, as it deserved. He hadn't expected Naughty Broughty to even see it let alone pluck it out of the air and hang on. Catch!!

That catch changed the game as Cookie, now with his tail up bowled beautifully in his 7 over spell to finish with 5 for 22. His best senior figures, so far. Matt provided fantastic support to finish with 3 for 23 from 16 magnificent overs.

Diddy needed 69 to win and it was only ten to three!

We knocked the runs off in around an hour for the loss of a couple, Matt and Cookie finishing with 27 not out each. Far sterner tests lie ahead I am sure.

Tea was taken at 4pm with the match over. As we sat eating our rolls and water melon, one of us was blissfully unaware that one of the Tesco mini pasties had been laced with LSD (A psychoactive, mind bending drug, credited with influencing many of the great creative minds of the sixties and seventies). This drug tricks the mind into conjuring up strange hallucinatory experiences. How else can you explain watching the Champions League semi final in the back of a car with an olympic medal winner then coining the now immortal line " My taxidermist is a part time cage fighter". This is what happens when you finish at 4pm and then start drinking. It is perhaps just as well we had left by the time the thirds returned.

Didcot 2nds won the toss and invited Kimble to bat first. Openers Les Addison and Carl Hancock started off well with tight and accurate bowling, Carl taking 3 wickets in his spell of 7 overs. Rob Keat and Sam Smith took over next. Both bowled well and Rob was unlucky not to take more than the two wickets he took. The best bowling performance came from Sam coming in from the 3^rd eleven in the 11^th hour on Saturday morning to cover for Henry Latimer called up to the 1^st. Sam was consistent, pitching the ball in the right spot to take his first ever five wicket haul- well done Sam.

Kimble were all out for 77 in the 26^th over. Too early for tea so straight back on the field with Prasad and Viraj opening the innings for Didcot.

Didcot lost Prasad Kankadandi when total was 19. Connor Morrison joined Viraj Perera and saw it through to tea at the 15th over with the total at 29 for one. After tea Viraj 40 not out and Connor 22 not out, hit the winning four to pass the home team total of 77 in the sixth over after tea to win the match in the 21^st over;

3rd Team match report.

The thirds hung on for a draw against Tiddington 3rds at Crowmarsh. Bowling first Didcot got off to a great start with Dan Stainthorpe picking up a wicket in his first over. Dan bowled beautifully, good length bowling with late in swing, and finished with excellent figures of 2-22. Mick at the other end took 6 overs to loosen up and picked up 2 wickets with excellent catches in the slips from Clive. 2-40 from 13 overs, another top performance from him. Narendra Mandadapu was making his 3rd team debut and toiled away for 16 straight overs, 1-63 not a fair reflection on how well he bowled. Sam Couldrick was not on as devastating form as last week but still showed excellent flight and turn but Boggy, promoted after last weeks display in the 4ths, bowled straight and took advantage of some indifferent bounce to take 3-20. Tiddington finished on 180 for 8 in their 45 overs, with their captain and opening batsman scoring 79 of them.

In reply, Didcot got off to a flyer with Elvis dispatching their opening bowler for 2 sixes in the first over. Unfortunately his stay at the crease was ended with the 9th ball of the innings. Sam, Boggy and Scanni all batted well but wickets fell regularly and Didcot were 55 for 5. This brought Clive and Mick together at the crease and they put on a stand of 60, with some text book shots and front foot slaps. You can work out who was playing each shot yourself! Clive was bowled for 34 by an excellent delivery and when Narendra got a ball that didn't bounce and hit middle stump, Didcot were 120 for 7 and looking to save the game. Jonny Meardon batted bravely and stuck with Mick, until Mick top edged an attempted pull (not sure why he was playing that shot with 5 overs to go!!) and was out for 36. Jonny departed in the next over, leaving Dan and DP to bat out 5 overs. DP batted sensibly to start, but when the bowler dropped it short he could not resist. His comment of 'I'll have a bit of that' left the fielders in stitches and the bowler not amused. 2 balls later he dropped it short again, and the ball got the same treatment. Rumour has it that DP was spotted at the Field of Dreams having a net on Saturday morning, somebody should tell him that you can't teach an old dog new tricks! Dan demonstrated a text book defence. He faced 20 balls from 2 hostile fast bowlers and did not give a chance. Didcot finished on 155 for 9. A better display in the field with regard to catching but we still need to improve our ground fielding.

Having secured the draw, the third team were disappointed to arrive back at the Field of Dream for a celebratory drink, only to find it all locked up. The second week running this has happened, some thirsty third team players suggested that maybe the thirds should play all the home games at the field of dreams as they seem to be the only side that can make a game of cricket last the distance and therefore maximise the bar profits!!

Didcot 4ths having had one drop out on Friday night and two more on Saturday it was therefore with some relief that we started the game with 11 players. To be fair we finished the game with 11 players, it is just that inbetween we only had 9. Oxford and Bletchingdon won the toss and put us in to bat. We moved to 19 for 2 before Biplob edged one onto his chin leaving a gaping gash from which the blood poured. Jonathan sacrificed himself and then drove Biplob to hospital to have the wound stitched up. The Didcot 4th IX struggled on, aided by extras, until the 34th over when we were all out for 159 (actually 159 for 8, but the hospital visitors had not returned). Some old geezer called Simon managed to carry his bat and score 63 not out with Alex Rodman scoring a useful 20. Biplob and Jonathan returned half way through tea, but too late to bat. Oxford and Bletchingdon crept towards their target losing the odd wicket on the way and finally passed the Didcot total in the 42nd over for the loss of six wickets. Four dropped catches did not help the Didcot cause. Chad took 3 for 20 in 8 overs.

A good all round performance, better than last week, but again we did not help our cause by dropping catches and not batting out our overs, even if we batted with 9 players.