With the league season having ended so disastrously, there was perhaps a chance to salvage something at the annual three-way 20-over tournament at Clumber Park. This year there was a strong Cambridgeshire element, with the third side, King's Keys, from "near Peterborough", although in truth our team today was half Romsey Town and half Clumber Park, so not quite pure Cambridge.
The day began with the five available Romsey regulars -- Andy, Malcolm, Rog, Russ and Daniel -- barrelling up the A1 at the ungodly hour of 8am. This did not sit well with late-nights and lots of beers, but everything was put right when we arrived at Clumber Park to find a massive barbeque breakfast waiting for us. The irony of eating sausage, egg and bacon butties (``the full monty'') as preparation for a sporting contest was only enhanced by the sight of several hundred fit-looking runners snaking their way past the ground, already well on their way to a half-marathon.
Then we got to kick back and watch our two opponents battling it out in the first match of the day. King's Keys made just 87/6 in their 20 overs, but their bowling attack was good enough to take the game into the last over, Clumber Park finishing on 88/6 with 4 balls left.
After an enormous lunch we finally took to the field and, as so often this year, we ended up almost wicketless, Clumber Park coasting along to 123/1. Not that we bowled and fielded too badly, Andy Owen (0/16), Daniel Mortlock (1/12), Russell Woolf (0/17) and Rog Shelley (0/14) all contributing to the fact that our target remained manageable. We did miss a few run-out chances, but at least we didn't drop any catches.
Whilst the Romsey regulars did the lion's share of the bowling, our Clumber Park contingent saw to it that we mounted an excellent run chase. Mike Beard (41), Chris Morris (19) and Tim Tingale (12) put us ahead of the required rate before Andy Owen (17), Daniel Mortlock (12*) and Steve Shelley (6*) saw us home off the first ball of the 20th over.
Just like last year we came into the final game as the only undefeated team, and looked likely to remain so as we ran through the King's Keys batting line-up like those annoying ``118 -- got your number'' wankers go ``straight through'' on the TV. Daniel Mortlock (2/15) and Russell Woolf (0/16) started pretty well, but then Mike Tingale (4/16) and Andy Owen (4/20) ran riot, the last five wickets falling for about fifteen runs. This time round the fielding wasn't just okay, it was excellent, with lots of great saves, some excellent catches held by Andy, Rog and Malcolm, the latter doing some excellent work standing up to the stumps.
Needing just over four an over we could afford to bat ``sensibly'', seeing off the more threatening of the King's Keys bowlers and eschewing 20-over style slogs in favour of quick singles or clever deflections. We started off following this plan, but some early wickets and an inadvertantly-scrambled batting order (to avoid the 90-second timed out rule) meant that we'd made just 26/3 after nine overs. Somehow we'd contrived to need a run a ball, but in the space of two wild overs Mike Tingale ensured his man of the match status by hitting 33 off about 20 balls. With Mike and Andy going well scoring 34 off eight overs with six wickets in hand should have been a trivial task. But a few loose shots, some more excellent bowling and a bit of scoreboard confusion meant that we still needed four to win off the final over with just two wickets left. A single and a wicket followed, so it all came down to the final ball.
We needed three to win or two to tie. The tournament's bonus points system meant that either of these results would give us the trophy, whereas King's Keys needed a wicket to catch up with Clumber Park (who would win the day in the event of a dot ball or a single).
Russ took a big swing but missed a wide one whilst his partner was already haring down the pitch to steal a bye. But then the umpire called ``wide'', giving us both a run and one more ball . . . except the batsmen hadn't seen the signal and kept running, so the tournament ended with a run out off a wide leaving us one run short of a tie and one point shy of both King's Keys and Clumber Park.
The only thing for it was to relive last year's bowl-off, which Clumber Park won comfortably. There was a brief presentation ceremony before the day finished as it began: with tons of grilled meat and the soporific rhythms of the the A1.