Fulmer (A) – 18.8.12

Fulmer 206-4 dec
Stewart 2-32, Zia 1-40

RUASCC 110 all out
Zia 82, Dip 11

RUASCC lost by 96 runs

On this baking hot Saturday afternoon in mid-August RUASCC were given a cricketing lesson for the second year in a row by Fulmer CC, just north of Slough. With only ten fielders we put in a decent shift but still got carted for over 200 in 41 overs, but with the bat everyone with the exception of Zia had their arses well and truly handed to them. It is fair to say that we missed the steadying influence of Ian Carpenter who didn’t quite manage to turn up on the right day.

Last season Fulmer scored 244-3 thanks largely to an unbeaten century by Field; this year Field opened again and scored another unbeaten century. I’m wondering if he shouldn’t perhaps change his name to “Bat”.

After Withers and Zia each opened with a maiden the runs started to flow and the score had reached 37 when Withers trapped Kuman LBW with a slower ball that may or may not have been hitting the stumps. This proved to be a mistake as it brought Ali to the wicket and he hit three of the remaining balls of Withers’ over to the boundary. Ali continued to thrash it around before he was eventually caught by Jagesh off Zia for 49.

The pace slowed somewhat after that as the two batsmen nudged the ball around taking long, slow singles in the energy-sapping heat. Jagesh and Ashman each had a spell without reward so Eagle turned to his breakthrough bowler Pensioner Ken Stewart. This worked almost straight away – Jagesh accepted another catch to finally end the 87-run partnership and King was bowled for 0 in the same over.

Fulmer carried on just long enough for Field to reach three figures then declared moments before Withers would have returned to clean up the tail.

The feeling in the RUASCC dressing room was that if we were to win the game then Zia would have to score a century. So Zia went out to open the batting with Eagle and before long we realised that if we were to win the game Zia would probably have to score a double-century.

While Zia took the bowling apart with some blistering strokes the rest of the batting line-up simply crumpled. The statistics are staggering: Dip and Extras were joint second top scorers on 11, then Eagle third with 5. The other seven batsmen contributed just ONE run between them. Six ducks, all clean bowled. And what makes it even worse – that one run was scored by Ken Stewart who remained not out.

Zia had already hit three fours and a six by the time Eagle was caught behind for the first wicket, then both Dersh and Rahul were bowled for 0 to leave us 28-3. Dip provided valuable support as the onslaught continued: Zia brought up his fifty with his tenth four then hit three more fours and a six to move to 70 - he was prepared to win the thing on his own until a leg injury severely hampered his running.

Sure enough the partnership was soon ended by a run out – but in fact it was Dip who failed to make his ground, beaten by a direct hit from the impressive Ali to end a partnership of 78. With Zia at the crease we still had hope, but the strength had deserted him and he offered two catching chances in successive balls, the second one taken at gully to end a quite brilliant innings of 82.

There was nothing left for RUASCC – when we lost Zia we lost the game. In just half an hour 106-3 became 110 all out as Fulmer finished the job with 16 overs to spare.

RUASCC Highlight: It was quite funny when Dip took a Zia drive directly in the chest at the non-striker’s end. Although possibly not for Dip.

RUASCC Man of the Match: Oh I don’t know really.

RUASCC Team: Zia, Eagle (capt), Dersh, Rahul, Dip (wkt), Scarr, Jagesh, Stewart, Withers, Ashman

RUASCC Apologies: Carpenter