There are days made for cricket, and there are days made for standing beneath the pavilion roof, looking at the sky with suspicion, and wondering whether Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego had the right idea after all. Sunday belonged rather firmly to the latter category: showery, gusty, and interrupted by the sort of weather that gives the covers more action than the lower batting order. The covers were on and off with the regularity of a minor Old Testament plague, though with rather more flapping at the corners.
Modbury batted first in difficult conditions, with rain never quite far enough away to be trusted. Still, amid the showers and shifting skies, there were some very respectable efforts.
The highlight of the innings was Guy Speed, who made an excellent 42 and looked in fine form before being dismissed just as another downpour began. Having somehow escaped mention in the previous two match reports, Guy returned to the narrative with purpose, burning with a generous heat that became him well — though not, it must be said, with quite the same alarming temperature as the pasties had at the break.
Lee Merchant, playing his first game of the year, was equally determined to make his presence felt. He batted steadily, picked his shots well, and brought a welcome air of calm to proceedings at a time when the weather, the pitch, and fate itself all seemed to be making alternative arrangements.
There was also another promising contribution from Ben Lane, playing only his third game. Casting aside the shadow of Ozymandias, King of Kings, Ben stood tall at the crease and batted with real confidence. Around him, the wrecks of empires may have stretched lone and level, but Ben, to his credit, kept his eye on the ball. At one point, he was almost heard to cry to the opposition, “Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!” He was, I believe, out next ball. But such is cricket. Shelley himself could hardly have improved the timing.
Modbury eventually reached 108 from 20 rain-disrupted overs — a perfectly decent effort in testing conditions, and one that gave the home side something to bowl at.
What followed, however, was village cricket in one of its purer and more bewildering forms.
Modbury’s bowling and fielding display was the sort of thing to alter one’s whole conception of man as nature’s last word. Surely, one found oneself thinking, nature can do better than this. One hardly knows where to begin, particularly when the author holds such love, respect and affection for the team.
Let us begin, then, with the drops.
Ben Lane produced what, in isolation, was an absolutely textbook long barrier: knee down, body behind the line, hands in position, the sort of thing that could be placed in a coaching manual. The only difficulty was that he performed it roughly ten feet from where the ball was actually travelling. A minor detail, admittedly, but one that became more significant as the ball continued on its journey.
Sam Collidge, stationed on the boundary, found himself bamboozled by a slippery ball that changed direction more regularly than a British Prime Minister changes their policies. Captain John Compston, who by this stage had begun to resemble the Mona Lisa upon whom all the sorrows of the world had been visited, promptly dropped the next opportunity. In fairness, he later redeemed himself with a dramatic catch, proving that hope, though sometimes delayed and occasionally fumbled, is not always lost.
James “Slaps” Sloman did take a wicket, which should very much be recorded in the positive column. He also spent a fair portion of the innings either chasing the cricket ball or, on some occasions, appearing to be chased by it. The ball, like Jonah, seemed determined not to go where it had been sent. This gave the fielding effort a pleasingly chaotic energy, if not always a strategically watertight one.
And yet, amid the confusion, there were genuine bright spots.
Mark Trevethan took an excellent catch on the boundary, the sort of cool and competent moment that briefly made everyone wonder whether Modbury had been fielding well all along and merely concealing it for dramatic effect. Behind the stumps, George kept wicket with spirit, agility and a steady flow of badinage directed variously at batters, fielders, umpires, and, at one point, what may have been a passing pheasant. Between the commentary, he produced several dramatic dives, some of which even involved catching the ball.
As Cornwood pressed on, Modbury turned to the tail-end bowlers, who went to their task like Christians to the lions, though with marginally better footwear and rather more hope of a wicket. To their credit, they did rather more than merely survive.
Ben Lane impressed with the ball in hand, looking considerably more comfortable when delivering it than when it was travelling towards him at pace. Elias, having surely read Corinthians that morning, appeared to feel that generosity was the order of the day, and distributed the odd scoring opportunity with Christian feeling. And the final sacrifice came in the form of Howard “El Chappo” Williams, who accepted the ball with the air of a man who had glimpsed the writing on the wall and found, to his regret, that it was asking him to bowl.
Yet these tail-end bowlers kept going, shared wickets between them, and did their duty regardless of whose name sat above theirs on the Almighty’s list. Like Abou Ben Adhem, they may not have topped the roll call, but they did enough to be remembered kindly.
Cornwood, in the end, reached their target, and Modbury were left to reflect on a match of rain, wind, useful batting, hot pasties, dropped chances, unlikely redemption, and fielding that at times bordered on the theological.
It was not always polished. It was not always pretty. But it was, unmistakably, village cricket: brave in places, baffling in others, and sustained throughout by good humour, damp whites, and the stubborn belief that the next ball might yet improve matters.
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