TURN THOSE BLOODY LIGHTS OFF, THERE’S A WAR ON

 

Sunday XI vs Cuckfield 18th September

 

Pre-Match Stuff

§          Barker Junior, conscious that the Saturday games have finished for the season and fearful of having to spend consecutive days at home, sends numerous emails pleading to be included in the Sunday game.

§          Skipper Van Brad responds by picking Retchup but makes room by dropping Papa Barker, Tommy’s out-of-form father.

§          Saturday comes. Zim realises his chances of surpassing last year’s ‘highest tile’ on Cuckfield pavilion in his current poor form are zippo and drops out by text citing a ‘slight twinge in my back’.

§          T*ts offers Papa Barker the chance to replace Zim which the Bearded Wonder accepts with indecent haste.

§          Sunday comes. For a long time, the accepted method of selection in the Sunday team has been if you’re in the pub after the game and declare yourself available, you’re selected. ASBO has been picked for every game (since his first) by this method. Despite this, and despite the fact he played last Sunday, he rings Captain Brad asking “Is there a game today and am I playing?” Stupid boy. Van Brad, in no mood to miss an opportunity, replies “Yes, pick me up at five to one”.

§          The contents of ASBO’s car are noted on the brief journey. They include a plug-in flashing orange light, IRA-style black balaclava, a jemmy and sufficient coins to fill a sock. When asked to explain, ASBO states “I just had to have them”. Work it out for yourself.

§          ASBO has also shaved his eyebrows for the game. He told us that sometime during Saturday evening he had “a moment of inspiration whilst listening to Smooth Operator by Sade and just had to razor those bad boys off”. Class.

§          Nabob is playing his first Sunday game for some time. His changing room quotes include “It’s nice to don a Stapleshit fielding shirt again” and, during a fantasy league discussion, “I tried to slip in Shrubby”. These two quotes may be related.

§          Nabob also arrives with a bouffant hairstyle the likes of which haven’t been seen since the days of Mike Barker. For anyone reading this who didn’t know Mike, he was a Scandinavian Barker with big blonde candy floss hair.

 

Match Stuff

 

·          Pike & the Doff Man open the bowling and rightfully so as they return the best figures of the day. Having said that, they were bowling at a time when their semi-pro wasn’t batting. Cowards.

·          Doff’s wickets included a boy he used to teach at Ardingly and a girl. After being bowled, the boy was on the receiving end on one of the politest sledges ever, the Doffer doffing his cap before whispering something along the lines of ‘they don’t coach very well at Ardingly’.

·          Pikey is desperate to win the Sunday bowling cup and he reached feverish excitement after each of his two wickets.

·          ASBO is the 1st change bowler and incredibly takes 2 wickets. In his own words, “that was the most sh*t bowling spell ever”.

·          DT was 1st change at the other end and bowled well considering he had to bowl at their pro. You can’t beat experience.

·          Mercado was the 5th bowler to be used and wishes he wasn’t as he went for a staggering 35 runs off just 2 overs, including 2 huge sixes. A bowling all-rounder or a batting all-rounder? You decide.

·          The upshot was that their pro came in at No.8 and scored a rapid unbeaten 70 to take their total to 180.

·          A sub-standard tea was provided at half time (we have expectations now that we have our own tea lady)

·          Teen Wolf & Van Brad open up proceedings. Teen Wolf has clearly picked up the magic aura once owned (but now lost) by Papa Barker and is dropped 1st ball of the innings. He goes on to make 18 fortunate runs, just like Papa Barker used to do. Bradders bops along to 15 before holing out to mid-off, just like Bradders used to do.

·          Retchup is promoted to No.3 and is panic stricken. Why? He bats pretty well on his way to 13, but eventually succumbs to a full toss pie by chipping it politely to the fielder at mid-wicket. Stupid boy.

·          Revvin had spent an hour pre-match in the Cuckfield nets batting against the Threaders. Surely all this practice was bound to help in his elevated No.4 berth. Dot. Dot. Spoon chip, out for naught. Nice work. Thanks for coming.

·          Trisha Mercado, batting at No.5 still believes he has a chance of stealing the Sunday batting cup. Head down and with extreme determination he scores a match winning 76. But is his maths up to the same standard as his batting?

·          The out-of-form Papa Barker is a nervous man walking out to the crease and the prod to his 1st delivery nearly has him caught behind. He survives though and goes on to make a creditable 23 before being bowled out by a girl. When you’re out of luck, embarrassment just seems to follow you around.

·          The September light closes, car headlights are on and so are the Pavilion ones. A WWII Bomber flies over head at which point the oppo wicket keeper delivers the line of the day “Turn those bloody lights off, there’s a war on”.

·          Mark “The Cucumber” Floyer is always the man not to panic in a crisis and his steady unbeaten 24 sees the Staplers home to a splendid win. Is there anything that could break this man’s cool?

·          It’s fair to say that Rossi was not as cool as a Floyer like cucumber when he was next man in knowing we needed to push the runs on to secure the victory. In fact it’d also be fair to say he was shatting himself. However, out to the middle he duly went (after unsuccessfully trying to bribe Pikey to a batting order place swap) and took guard knowing he already had a cluster of ducks to his name already this season. And he didn’t disappoint. It only took him a couple of deliveries before he paddled the ball round to short fine leg and set off full of groin injuries on a suicidal single. Run out naught. On a happier note, he did return to the Pavilion peeing himself laughing.

·          Pikey was next man up to try and save the day and was the next man to fail. He spends 7 hours a day practising his forward defensive in his bedroom and still manages to edge one behind when he gets out into the middle.

·          ASBO gets an eyebrow raising promotion to No.10. Shame he hasn’t got any anymore. Didn’t face a ball, but was all smiles after The Cucumber hit the winning boundary.

·          DT, probably for the millionth time in his career is left all padded up with nowhere to go.

 

Post Match Stuff

 

·          Papa Barker moans and groans his way through the post match beers claiming unsporting behaviour from the opposition. No-one else has the first idea what he’s banging on about.