It’s a Sunday morning in July, Dorking, deepest Surrey. It’s raining. It’s not just raining, its that soaking ‘I’m going to be here all day’ rain. As I sip my flat white made from my recently purchased self indulgent coffee machine, the cricketing demons start to creep in.
This is going to be rained off right? We can’t play in this surely? But what about the teas that the O’Connells have gone to so much effort to plan?
Having no word on the CICC WhatsApp group of anything close to a cancellation, I begin the journey into the south of London for our fixture against a new team, the Mighty Wanderers. To my knowledge, CICC have never played this team however by all accounts, they are a friendly social team with a similar ethos to our cricket loving club. They are also a regular fixture for our friends, Plastics CC, who we would typically play for the O’Connell catered fixture. Despite the weather, I looked forward meeting them and the fixture.
At Dorking Deepdene station (one of the three railway stations in Dorking just so you know) I joined the other Dorking residing CICC member, Tom Bage. After discussing the weather and the planned teas, we agreed that if we were feeling this way, we could only imagine what the opposition were thinking. “There’s no chance we are playing in this”. The recent election results may have been discussed as well.
We make our way into London and after a change at Redhill and then another at East Croydon we were joined at the bus stop by the ever elusive Shantan. In a t-shirt in the pouring rain? As the bus made it’s slow ponderous way to the ground we observed the usual influx of weather related texts on the group chat. “Proper raining here now”, “Have driven through a few [showers]”, “I guess the rain may force us to play on the astro”. My favourite one was from our catering specialist Sammy who quite early on optimistically stated, “weather currently glorious in South Norwood”. The host is always optimistic and I shared his outlook.
This was to be my first experience of the South Norwood Cricket Ground and after a short walk from the bus stop, I was pleased to find it had all of the hallmarks of a typical council ground. No pavilion, no facilities, no covers, nowhere to shelter. But it had a village feel to it with a nicely prepared square with a slightly undulating field, a large tree overhanging the boundary that players naturally congregated under and, strangely, the Croydon Sailing Club who use the small lake adjacent to the ground for their dinky sailing boats. Each to their own I guess.
The players were arriving quickly and for the first time in living memory, all eleven of the CICC players arrived before the scheduled start of play! Even Matt. No easy fines here. The same couldn’t be said for the opposition who, quite understandably, may have delayed their home departures awaiting the cancellation notification. They did not take into account the quality of the promised teas as the CICC men had. As the opposition began to trickle in and after the obligatory pitch inspections, toss speculation and sky gazing, Matt won the toss and elected to field first. His rationale being that we would rather be batting after the robust teas. A prudent decision at the time.
Once all the bowlers’ spikes had been removed as we were indeed using the astro pitch, overlooked by swollen dark clouds we made our way onto the field with an aim of playing a 35/35 format. Tom Bage opened the bowling from the tree end with a tidy maiden over. Jaymin Pandya (and friends) bowled from the radio tower end (Editor’s note: it’s the Tennis Court End) and was similarly economical. In short order both openers were out for six apiece with a catch off Jaymin’s bowling and a cleaned bowled off Tom’s. Their third batsman transpired to be troublesome to dismiss and he was initially joined by our very own Jon Stern who, with the promise of many runs and copious wickets, filled in for the Wanderers.
After five overs each, Dad replaced the opening bowlers with himself and elusive Shantan. It was noted that Shantan’s whites were slightly whiter than usual but he needs to be a bit more liberal with the Vanish for the next load of washing. After a quick two and two, our Jon Stern was dismissed by Goodman for four (Editor’s note: Falling to an excellent slip catch by DBB, despite Ed Greg’s lunge across him from 2nd slip). By this point the threatening weather came to fruition and there were a couple of overs of rain increasing in intensity before the umpire (who repeatedly turned his hands up as if he can feel the rain level) called a break in play and we retreated to the beforementioned tree for mild shelter.
Thanks to Sammy’s foresight there was a beer cooler already in position and it didn’t take long for bored cricketers to get into them and ponder the meaning of an english summer. Being a club that is relatively interested in politics, the conversation again turned to the recent election with respectful opinions passed amongst us. The rainfall continued to increase in intensity and Sammy called home and informed his family that 22 men are decamping and on their way.
After a short stroll into the South London suburbia and after finding somewhere to stash my cricket kit and remove my soggy shoes, I found myself in the O’Connell’s conservatory casting an eye over the teas. They were a revelation! Marinated mini-sausages, wraps, sandwiches, sausage rolls, cream & jam scones, cakes. It was all there. A remarkable tea experience and full credit to all involved for it’s planning and preparation.
Couple the teas with a replay of the Wallabies victory over Wales the day prior, and watching Matt entertain Sammy’s 14 month old daughter (classic Dad) and the smiles returned to the faces of the cricketers. During this period of face stuffing I couldn’t help but notice a young Wanderer return to the spread for a third helping thus making himself a target for some light hearted ribbing from me. After severe embarassment he went onto make a total of five helpings which I thought showed good character against a strong attack.
Satiated and with the rain stopping, we returned to the ground to find it drenched and, to use a golfing term, there was visible standing water dotted around the ground with no avenue for swing relief. This was going to be an interesting end to the the Wanderers innings and the CICC innings to come. With full stomachs, Goodman and elusive Shantan continued the bowling with Shantan removing their top scorer (Heafield) caught on 42 and Matt ending up on figures of 2 for 22 after five overs. Pretty good!
By this stage the Wanderers were on 81 after 18 overs and in a bit of trouble. The ball was tossed to me and after getting used to the precarious run-up I was lucky enough to bowl out a couple of their batsmen in three overs. As a throw back to a Ploughmans match a few years ago, my name was again recorded as ‘Boyle’ in the scorebook and the resultant nicknaming of ‘Susan’ and other women’s names beginning with ‘S’ ensued. I bowled the last over and ended up on 2 for 11 . The Wanderers completed their innings on 121 with a decent fightback from N.Charlton (27). To recap the bowling, special mentions to Tom with figures of 1 for only 8 runs after 5 overs, and Jaymin (and friends) with 1 for 16 after 5 overs as well. (Editor’s note: It’s probably worth mentioning some very lethargic post-tea fielding, even if it shines a light on me in particular – and I was one of the few wearing spikes!)
By this stage the weather was improving with glimpses of blue sky appearing but the outfield remained sodden.
With 122 the target and a relatively quick innings change, DB and Ed Gregs proceeded out to the middle to open for CICC. The opening bowlers for the Wanderers were very tidy in their first two overs only allowing for 2 runs scored from their bowling. But things started to open up for the batsmen with a couple of consecutive fours for Mr Gregory in over number three. The opening bowler from the tree end (J.Bolton) kept it tight with his subsequent overs ending up on figures of 2 for 21 after 5 overs dismissing Ed on 21 (caught) and DB on 12 (also caught).
After being replaced by Steve Smith and our host Sammy O’Connell, and with Sammy seeing off the openers, things really started to motor along. To give you an indication of the weather, I was scoring and had by this point moved my chair to the sideline to enjoy the sunshine after previously being under the trees to protect the pages from the rain. It was also easier to hear the answer to the typical ‘bowlers name?’ questions. The sun was shining and it was shining on CICC.
The boundaries begain to pile up with a good few being scored by Steve but the lion’s share going to Sammy. In one particular over our host hit four consecutive fours. Being part of the bowlers union I felt for the bowler and stopped clapping my teammate after the second. Sorry Sammy.
During this innings, special note was being taken of our CICC man playing for the Wanderers* (Mr Stern) who was fielding better than he usually does for us. In good spirit, we began to boo him when he stopped any runs much to the appreciation of the Wanderers. He was also thrown the ball to roll the arm over in the final stages of the match in the hope that he could remove Sammy from the middle. Thankfully Jon was not able to do so and ended up on figures of none for 14 after 2 overs.
In the 19th over, with only five runs remaining in CICC’s chase, the opening bowler (T.Chazzy) was given the pill but by that stage Sammy was seeing them like pumpkins and proceeded to hit two fours to win the match for CICC. The last four brought up Sammy’s half century with a total of 53 not out. Steve Smith also finished not out on 24.
After polite clapping, handshakes and well wishes we said goodbye to the Wanderers as CICC returned to the O’Connell’s for the obligatory fines and awards session. We really enjoyed the company and competition of the Mighty Wanderers and look forward to playing them in future years.
Our fines session had a special guest which was Sammy’s father who assisted with the banter and gentle ribbing especially of his son. I was reminded of my own relationship with my father. Even if I scored a half century not out and carried the team to victory, there would still be a sideways comment or two.
So in summary, good ground, great opposition, superb teas……..poor weather. That sums up cricket in England in my opinion.
Special mentions to James Lynch and Bhavik Pandya who neither batted or bowled. Thanks for coming. I hope you had a good week afterwards.
About the author: James Royal, hedgehog enthusiast, former Fat Controller (he’s not fat, but he was in charge of the trains), Chancellor of the CICC, wine connoisseur, and our answer to Richie Benaud. But he doesn’t let all these hobbies get in the way of his cricket, a skiddy bowler that gets onto you quicker than you expect, he’s also a destructive batter, as demonstrated by his maiden CICC 50 at Leckford in 2022 (sorry, Leckford stats don’t count!)
