The day was warm and sunny, if a bit muggy . . . but the night before had been just too wet, and Andy got "the call" from the Fulbourn captain at about 11am this morning.
Such is the nature of the CCA league system, though, that today's non-result has all but decided the overall result of our season. After last week's match it was still plausible that we could reach promotion or sink to relegation. But the moment today's match against Fulbourn was called off (i.e., without knowing the results of the other league games) relegation became all but impossible. Even if we were to lose our final two matches and get no batting or bowling points (i.e., take no wickets and make less than 40 runs both times), we'd still have 146 points from 13 games, giving us a league average of 11.23. Last-placed Babraham can only raise their average to 10.38, even if they were to win all their last four games, so that just leaves Weston Colville and NCI to worry about. Now, whilst either of these teams could get above us (with maximum possible averages of 11.64 and 12.60, respectively), they can't both get above us. The critical point is that they have to play each other twice, which means they'd have to split some of the points on offer. Weston Colville can only get above us if they win all their remaining games, including the two against NCI; but that would mean NCI getting a maximum of two lots of 10 batting and bowling points. In that case their league average would be 11.27, which is above our minimum possible average . . . but if either of our remaining games are washed out or we pass 40 runs or we take 2 wickets in an innings then our minimum average would go up to 11.31. And whilst Romsey Collapses are an unfortunate club habit, even the most pessimistic of follower wouldn't believe us getting bowled out twice for under 40 . . .
. . . not that we even had to worry about that by day's end. Despite NCI's massive upset win over second-placed Wilbrahams, Weston Colville lost to Fen Ditton, meaning they can't possibly overtake us. They finished the day with just 87 points from 11 matches, with 3 remaining, so even winning all three would only take them to 147 points from 14 matches. That would give them a league average of 10.50, 0.77 behind Romsey Town's worst possible result mentioned above. So that means we can really go out and have fun in our final two matches, setting silly fields, inverting the batting order, bowling with the wrong han- er, what's that, Andy? Oh right. Scratch that: it'll be business as usual . . .
. . . which is that the batting and bowling awards will go to their most regular recipients. The 2007, 2003, 1998, 1997, 1994 and 1992 winner of the batting award, Andy Owen (371 runs at 92.75), is miles ahead of Nick Clarke (345 runs at 43.12) in the batting averages; and the 2007, 2003 and 1990 winner of the bowling award, Russell Woolf (13 wickets at 13.77) is similar far ahead of Daniel Mortlock (17 wickets at 20.06) in the bowling averages.