“We would have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn’t for those meddling kids”
After passionately declaring all cricket balls to be lethal “vectors of disease”, likening them to the rats that carried the Black Death across the world in the 14th century, Boris Johnson seemed to be gearing up for one his by now famous screeching U-turns. Lo and behold, mere days later, the decision banning the most socially distant of sports was reversed and Saturday 11th July was slated as the Great Day of Return.
Village greens and inner-city wickets around the country were hastily assembled into a vaguely presentable condition, much like a hungover office worker desperately dragging a comb through the hair and spraying deodorant liberally across the torso following an unexpectedly hedonistic Thursday night. As expected, the results were somewhere south of satisfactory.
It just so happened that one of London’s premier amateur outfits, the Hendrick’s XI, had a pre-standing fixture with new opposition, Stoke Newington CC 4th XI, on this very day. Teams beyond the depths of a 3rd XI tend to be the leisurely preserve of old-timers and youthful up-and-coming – and this amicable bunch proved to be no exception. “We’ve got a few of the kids in the team today”, was the skipper’s off-hand introduction. “Sure, no problem”, we replied, blissfully unaware of the calibre of said kids.
First innings: Stoke Newington to bat
After confidently winning the toss with his usual enthusiasm, captain Tim Saunders wasted no time in electing to bowl – the tried and tested choice for a side only ever one ball away from a spectacular batting collapse. After twirling his luxuriously maintained moustache for a few moments he tossed the new ball to James Gilbert, whose steps to emulate bowling hero Stuart Broad had now extended to a luscious, lockdown-enforced set of blond locks and a newly purchased headband.*
*Also on this online order were, oddly, pairs of both right- and left-handed gloves; Gilbert having assumed you bought each glove individually, apparently undeterred by the clearly extortionate price and being unfamiliar with the process, having spent many years getting all his kit hand-stitched and monogrammed by his trusted sports tailor, Giuseppe Rodolfo (who was, naturally, unavailable due to corona-related restrictions).
He opened in tandem with Lobmeister General Henry Wickham, the alternative overs of pace and definitely-not-pace initially working well – with one batsman commenting he “didn’t expect it to be so loopy” after offering no stroke to a vintage Wickham delivery probing the leg stump. But after a few sighters the batsmen took a shine to the bowling, as the Middlesex Under-13s ‘could-play-for-England-one-day’ opener livened things up with a punishing array of stroke play.
Clearly more used to facing sizzling 80mph county bowling, the lukewarm fare served up here was a buffet from which he greedily partook. The shortened boundaries – brought in to negate the deadening effects of an untended outfield swaying in the breeze around the ankles – only helped turn fours into sixes as the ball regularly found itself disturbing the progress of adjacent matches on the aptly named Hackney Marshes.
With damage being inflicted and no wickets in sight (presumably they, too, had become lost in the thicket-like outfield), Saunders turned to ‘Mr. Hendrick’s’ himself; leading wicket taker, James Hewlett. The effect was almost instantaneous as the dangerously high-energy action and low-speed bowling of the legendary Big V had the batsmen stumped – both metaphorically and literally – the ball trundling politely past a couple of over-ambitious heaves of the bat. Springing into action, Saunders used the entirety of his body to comprehensively demolish the stumps and remove any lingering uncertainty over the dismissal.
At the other end, Jonny Franks was making a welcome return after almost 12 months out of the side, during which time he had joined a proper team, learned to bowl properly and come back as one of the Hendrick’s XI’s increasing contingent of ‘proper cricketers’. He went wicketless despite a ferocious spell of bowling, not helped by some ferociously substandard fielding and regulation drops.
With the ball being shelled – or, indeed, actively avoided by some – breakthroughs were proving hard to come by. Thankfully, some inexplicably shambolic running from Stoke Newington (possibly engineered to ensure a more competitive game), coupled with some inexplicably competent ground feeling, kept the fall of wickets steady as no fewer than four run outs hobbled their relentless march towards the 200-run mark.
Hendrick’s were also the beneficiaries of some generous umpiring as Hewlett contrived to make six feet feel like six miles when he propelled himself with almost no momentum into a slow-motion dive, like an athlete attempting the now-defunct Olympic field event of the Standing Long Jump (regrettably scrapped from the sporting roster back in 1912). In completing a run out he fell dramatically towards the stumps, resembling a decades-old satellite dropping out of orbit and slamming back into the earth’s crust, much to the bemusement of the umpire standing a few inches away.
Owez Madhani was in the thick of the action with some tidy work on the boundary, helping effect two of the tag-team run out efforts, while new man Tom Nolan, having relieved the skipper of his behind-the-stumps duties, impressed in his debut for the club – displaying an almost worrying level of competence. Much like an actual scientist offering valid, fact-based opinions against a backdrop of headline-grabbing political nonsense, he stood out.
As Stoke Newington’s momentum stalled the Hendrick’s XI finally cashed in, shambling back to the metaphorical off-licence having splashed out on a hefty stack of Scratch Cards only to finally win back a fiver. Josh Peffers was one of the beneficiaries, using his variation deliveries of wides and no balls to great effect, riddling the batsmen’s shot selection with doubt. His two wickets owed much to some superbly athletic fielding from Franks and an accomplished grab from Harry Homan, and he would have added to his total had he not shelled a routine caught & bowled.
Oli May’s cameo with the ball was most memorable for his mid-over explosion at the teenage umpire, who had the audacity to call one of his deliveries as a wide. May went full John McEnroe on the unsuspecting adjudicator, brandishing it “a dreadful call” before angrily stomping back to his mark muttering something that sounded like, “you cannot be serious”. He was subsequently fined an undisclosed percentage of his match fee, having already been reprimanded for similar offences against youth players at previous opposition clubs.
Strolling casually back into the team after two years away was Shahi Ghani – an absence further elongated as he drifted on to the pitch almost half an hour after the game had started (he would subsequently over compensate by turning up for the next two fixtures an hour and a day early, respectively). His unassuming action immediately caused problems for the batsmen as the run rate hit a rare dry patch. A miserly three-over spell and an excellent clean-bowled wicket leaving him with immaculate figures of one for nine.
For the final few overs, Saunders turned back to his opening bowlers, having spotted the destructive Middlesex prodigy returning to the middle after his previous retirement at 50. The results, unsurprisingly, were much the same, as Gilbert and Wickham resumed their titanic duel with the accomplished batsman, only to be clattered to the fence with effortless regularity. With the innings ending in the same blaze of destruction in which it had started, a steep total of 279 for nine was reached, leaving the Hendrick’s XI in need of a record run chase to snatch an unlikely victory.
Second Innings: Hendrick’s XI need 280 to win
Saunders and Madhani began the reply, playing tidily against some alarmingly rapid teenage opponents. Madhani was back opening the batting for the first time since his tooth-shattering experiencing doing the same last year. Diligently helmeted, with some expensive dental insurance now in place as well, he showed his usual fluidity with a couple of classic left-handed drives that set the team on their way, only to then offer a catch to mid-off.
Saunders was more watchful, grinding out 11 off 33 balls before some chin music finally did the trick. Having swayed elegantly out of the way of one that whistled past his trademark spectacles, he then attempted an expansive hook shot at a ball directed at the cranium. Despite no one appealing for a catch he immediately popped his bat under his arm, whipped off his gloves and began the long walk back to the team’s mass of bikes, beers and Mrs. Hewlett’s cake out on the boundary edge – the opposition still bemused by his peerless sportsmanship.
Fortunately, coming in at number three was the self-proclaimed “Big Hittin’, Big Pimpin’” Ross Quest, making his first appearance since 2017 – having only just returned to civilisation after years spent wandering the wilderness in an ayahuasca-fuelled ‘vision quest’. He quickly found his range and found himself back in his established role as Hendrick’s most established, most reluctant, most enigmatic batsman.
He was joined by an able deputy in Nolan, who continued to establish himself an instant fan-favourite with some eye-catching boundaries, while Quest teed off aggressively at the other end. Their explosive chemistry saw Hendrick’s sail past 100 before they fell valiantly, only to be replaced by an even more destructive new-look partnership.
Making his debut after lurking voyeuristically on the Hendrick’s WhatsApp chat for the past couple of years, Harry Homan showed the team what they’d been missing out on with the batting performance of the innings. Alongside middle-order stalwart and notorious loose cannon Oli May, he led an impressive charge towards the required run rate, nudging the team’s chances of victory from Impossible to Improbable on the Hendrick’s patented Run-o-Meter™.
After gracefully retiring at 50 off just 40 balls, Homan made way for a freshly tanned and trim Peffers, who now boasted a dashing goatee – apparently inspired after endlessly watching the Pirates of the Caribbean marathon during a protracted coronavirus isolation. Despite being keen to prove his prowess with the bat after an intensive winter training camp at Lord’s, his new skills and fresh look didn’t translate into runs, even with the overturn of an early dismissal via the bootleg Decision Review System being operated out in the middle.
He was followed to the crease by James ‘The Finisher’ Gilbert, whose penchant for clinching dramatic, final-over victories with swashbuckling stroke play was by now legendary, thanks largely to Gilbert’s persistent retelling of the tales to unsuspecting team members, weary shop clerks and confused bystanders. Sadly, this particular feat was beyond even his Herculean abilities, having raised hopes with a stylish boundary before dashing them immediately after as he was clean bowled.
A solid cameo from Franks and a final flourish from the immovable May was at least enough to secure the Hendrick’s XI their highest ever total in all 10 of their perpetually unpredictable seasons, as they closed on a shockingly respectable 246 for six. It was, they all agreed, a “highly enjoyable” defeat – a phrase that immediately inspired the club’s new motto: Felicitas in Calamitate, which directly translates as ‘happiness in calamity’.
A fitting assessment of the team’s decade of existence.
A glorious day, a highly respectable return, and the long-awaited 10-Year Anniversary Season was finally up and running. “Yes, and we’d have gotten away with it, too”, grumbled Peffers, “had it not been for you blasted, meddling kids.”
After passionately declaring all cricket balls to be lethal “vectors of disease”, likening them to the rats that carried the Black Death across the world in the 14th century, Boris Johnson seemed to be gearing up for one his by now famous screeching U-turns. Lo and behold, mere days later, the decision banning the most socially distant of sports was reversed and Saturday 11th July was slated as the Great Day of Return.
Village greens and inner-city wickets around the country were hastily assembled into a vaguely presentable condition, much like a hungover office worker desperately dragging a comb through the hair and spraying deodorant liberally across the torso following an unexpectedly hedonistic Thursday night. As expected, the results were somewhere south of satisfactory.
It just so happened that one of London’s premier amateur outfits, the Hendrick’s XI, had a pre-standing fixture with new opposition, Stoke Newington CC 4th XI, on this very day. Teams beyond the depths of a 3rd XI tend to be the leisurely preserve of old-timers and youthful up-and-coming – and this amicable bunch proved to be no exception. “We’ve got a few of the kids in the team today”, was the skipper’s off-hand introduction. “Sure, no problem”, we replied, blissfully unaware of the calibre of said kids.
First innings: Stoke Newington to bat
After confidently winning the toss with his usual enthusiasm, captain Tim Saunders wasted no time in electing to bowl – the tried and tested choice for a side only ever one ball away from a spectacular batting collapse. After twirling his luxuriously maintained moustache for a few moments he tossed the new ball to James Gilbert, whose steps to emulate bowling hero Stuart Broad had now extended to a luscious, lockdown-enforced set of blond locks and a newly purchased headband.*
*Also on this online order were, oddly, pairs of both right- and left-handed gloves; Gilbert having assumed you bought each glove individually, apparently undeterred by the clearly extortionate price and being unfamiliar with the process, having spent many years getting all his kit hand-stitched and monogrammed by his trusted sports tailor, Giuseppe Rodolfo (who was, naturally, unavailable due to corona-related restrictions).
He opened in tandem with Lobmeister General Henry Wickham, the alternative overs of pace and definitely-not-pace initially working well – with one batsman commenting he “didn’t expect it to be so loopy” after offering no stroke to a vintage Wickham delivery probing the leg stump. But after a few sighters the batsmen took a shine to the bowling, as the Middlesex Under-13s ‘could-play-for-England-one-day’ opener livened things up with a punishing array of stroke play.
Clearly more used to facing sizzling 80mph county bowling, the lukewarm fare served up here was a buffet from which he greedily partook. The shortened boundaries – brought in to negate the deadening effects of an untended outfield swaying in the breeze around the ankles – only helped turn fours into sixes as the ball regularly found itself disturbing the progress of adjacent matches on the aptly named Hackney Marshes.
With damage being inflicted and no wickets in sight (presumably they, too, had become lost in the thicket-like outfield), Saunders turned to ‘Mr. Hendrick’s’ himself; leading wicket taker, James Hewlett. The effect was almost instantaneous as the dangerously high-energy action and low-speed bowling of the legendary Big V had the batsmen stumped – both metaphorically and literally – the ball trundling politely past a couple of over-ambitious heaves of the bat. Springing into action, Saunders used the entirety of his body to comprehensively demolish the stumps and remove any lingering uncertainty over the dismissal.
At the other end, Jonny Franks was making a welcome return after almost 12 months out of the side, during which time he had joined a proper team, learned to bowl properly and come back as one of the Hendrick’s XI’s increasing contingent of ‘proper cricketers’. He went wicketless despite a ferocious spell of bowling, not helped by some ferociously substandard fielding and regulation drops.
With the ball being shelled – or, indeed, actively avoided by some – breakthroughs were proving hard to come by. Thankfully, some inexplicably shambolic running from Stoke Newington (possibly engineered to ensure a more competitive game), coupled with some inexplicably competent ground feeling, kept the fall of wickets steady as no fewer than four run outs hobbled their relentless march towards the 200-run mark.
Hendrick’s were also the beneficiaries of some generous umpiring as Hewlett contrived to make six feet feel like six miles when he propelled himself with almost no momentum into a slow-motion dive, like an athlete attempting the now-defunct Olympic field event of the Standing Long Jump (regrettably scrapped from the sporting roster back in 1912). In completing a run out he fell dramatically towards the stumps, resembling a decades-old satellite dropping out of orbit and slamming back into the earth’s crust, much to the bemusement of the umpire standing a few inches away.
Owez Madhani was in the thick of the action with some tidy work on the boundary, helping effect two of the tag-team run out efforts, while new man Tom Nolan, having relieved the skipper of his behind-the-stumps duties, impressed in his debut for the club – displaying an almost worrying level of competence. Much like an actual scientist offering valid, fact-based opinions against a backdrop of headline-grabbing political nonsense, he stood out.
As Stoke Newington’s momentum stalled the Hendrick’s XI finally cashed in, shambling back to the metaphorical off-licence having splashed out on a hefty stack of Scratch Cards only to finally win back a fiver. Josh Peffers was one of the beneficiaries, using his variation deliveries of wides and no balls to great effect, riddling the batsmen’s shot selection with doubt. His two wickets owed much to some superbly athletic fielding from Franks and an accomplished grab from Harry Homan, and he would have added to his total had he not shelled a routine caught & bowled.
Oli May’s cameo with the ball was most memorable for his mid-over explosion at the teenage umpire, who had the audacity to call one of his deliveries as a wide. May went full John McEnroe on the unsuspecting adjudicator, brandishing it “a dreadful call” before angrily stomping back to his mark muttering something that sounded like, “you cannot be serious”. He was subsequently fined an undisclosed percentage of his match fee, having already been reprimanded for similar offences against youth players at previous opposition clubs.
Strolling casually back into the team after two years away was Shahi Ghani – an absence further elongated as he drifted on to the pitch almost half an hour after the game had started (he would subsequently over compensate by turning up for the next two fixtures an hour and a day early, respectively). His unassuming action immediately caused problems for the batsmen as the run rate hit a rare dry patch. A miserly three-over spell and an excellent clean-bowled wicket leaving him with immaculate figures of one for nine.
For the final few overs, Saunders turned back to his opening bowlers, having spotted the destructive Middlesex prodigy returning to the middle after his previous retirement at 50. The results, unsurprisingly, were much the same, as Gilbert and Wickham resumed their titanic duel with the accomplished batsman, only to be clattered to the fence with effortless regularity. With the innings ending in the same blaze of destruction in which it had started, a steep total of 279 for nine was reached, leaving the Hendrick’s XI in need of a record run chase to snatch an unlikely victory.
Second Innings: Hendrick’s XI need 280 to win
Saunders and Madhani began the reply, playing tidily against some alarmingly rapid teenage opponents. Madhani was back opening the batting for the first time since his tooth-shattering experiencing doing the same last year. Diligently helmeted, with some expensive dental insurance now in place as well, he showed his usual fluidity with a couple of classic left-handed drives that set the team on their way, only to then offer a catch to mid-off.
Saunders was more watchful, grinding out 11 off 33 balls before some chin music finally did the trick. Having swayed elegantly out of the way of one that whistled past his trademark spectacles, he then attempted an expansive hook shot at a ball directed at the cranium. Despite no one appealing for a catch he immediately popped his bat under his arm, whipped off his gloves and began the long walk back to the team’s mass of bikes, beers and Mrs. Hewlett’s cake out on the boundary edge – the opposition still bemused by his peerless sportsmanship.
Fortunately, coming in at number three was the self-proclaimed “Big Hittin’, Big Pimpin’” Ross Quest, making his first appearance since 2017 – having only just returned to civilisation after years spent wandering the wilderness in an ayahuasca-fuelled ‘vision quest’. He quickly found his range and found himself back in his established role as Hendrick’s most established, most reluctant, most enigmatic batsman.
He was joined by an able deputy in Nolan, who continued to establish himself an instant fan-favourite with some eye-catching boundaries, while Quest teed off aggressively at the other end. Their explosive chemistry saw Hendrick’s sail past 100 before they fell valiantly, only to be replaced by an even more destructive new-look partnership.
Making his debut after lurking voyeuristically on the Hendrick’s WhatsApp chat for the past couple of years, Harry Homan showed the team what they’d been missing out on with the batting performance of the innings. Alongside middle-order stalwart and notorious loose cannon Oli May, he led an impressive charge towards the required run rate, nudging the team’s chances of victory from Impossible to Improbable on the Hendrick’s patented Run-o-Meter™.
After gracefully retiring at 50 off just 40 balls, Homan made way for a freshly tanned and trim Peffers, who now boasted a dashing goatee – apparently inspired after endlessly watching the Pirates of the Caribbean marathon during a protracted coronavirus isolation. Despite being keen to prove his prowess with the bat after an intensive winter training camp at Lord’s, his new skills and fresh look didn’t translate into runs, even with the overturn of an early dismissal via the bootleg Decision Review System being operated out in the middle.
He was followed to the crease by James ‘The Finisher’ Gilbert, whose penchant for clinching dramatic, final-over victories with swashbuckling stroke play was by now legendary, thanks largely to Gilbert’s persistent retelling of the tales to unsuspecting team members, weary shop clerks and confused bystanders. Sadly, this particular feat was beyond even his Herculean abilities, having raised hopes with a stylish boundary before dashing them immediately after as he was clean bowled.
A solid cameo from Franks and a final flourish from the immovable May was at least enough to secure the Hendrick’s XI their highest ever total in all 10 of their perpetually unpredictable seasons, as they closed on a shockingly respectable 246 for six. It was, they all agreed, a “highly enjoyable” defeat – a phrase that immediately inspired the club’s new motto: Felicitas in Calamitate, which directly translates as ‘happiness in calamity’.
A fitting assessment of the team’s decade of existence.
A glorious day, a highly respectable return, and the long-awaited 10-Year Anniversary Season was finally up and running. “Yes, and we’d have gotten away with it, too”, grumbled Peffers, “had it not been for you blasted, meddling kids.”