Wood Street Village vs Frimley Green Cricket Club - Sunday 21st June 2026, 13:00

On a blazing afternoon when the sun seemed determined to fry anything that moved, the opposition won the toss and chose to bat. Their openers started on a cautious note in first few overs but from sixth over, they suddenly transformed into IPL T20 monsters. Our bowlers rotated like a merry-go-round, but nothing slowed them. Boundaries were coming in abundance, some from their skills and some from our misfielding. Also, at 30+ degrees, with sun blazing down from the sky, our players were squinting and misjudging the ball’s trajectory so badly it looked like we were auditioning for blindfold cricket. Catches that normally fall into our hands like ripe mangoes were now falling…on the ground. At around 167-0 in 16 overs, they were all set to score 300-400 runs, maybe even 500 if the sun kept assisting. But then came the plot twist. One opener reached 100 and retired because of their club rule. This rule, designed to “give everyone a chance,” instead gave us a chance. After that opener was gone, their run rate didn’t just slow down, it collapsed, flatlined. One run per over. Two if they were feeling adventurous. We also started taking wickets at regular intervals. As our skipper Manoj wisely said: “There’s nothing wrong with our bowlers; the batsman was wrong.” With second opener also gone after making 67 runs, game was back in our control. Those openers were the only good batsman that they had. We now had the hope of restricting them below 250, which we could chase. We were in a dilemma though, if we should take all the wickets and risk the retired centurion returning, or slow down and avoid summoning him? But as a true sportsmen, we kept taking wickets to show that we were not afraid of chasing a high score. In 39th over, we took their 9th wicket and the retired batsman came back. He wasted no time in hitting boundaries from first ball itself. Our strategy was to get him off the strike and try to take the other batman’s wicket. We nearly succeeded in that when the other batsman lobbed the ball on short, but Amit dropped an easy catch and they took 1 run. The opener then hit three consecutive boundaries and 1 run to end the 40th over. That dropped catch cost us the satisfaction of having them all out and also added 13 expensive runs to their scoreboard. They ended up on 265-9. Amit and Mahendran started off well with a high run rate from first over itself but Amit couldn’t get his mind away from his dropped catch and gave his wicket away cheaply after making just 2 runs. Mahendran and Pinang built a lovely partnership, and they added much needed runs very quickly. But it did not last very long and Pinang got out. Next batman also got out on a duck. Situation was getting tense now because even though our run rate was fine, we were losing too many wickets, too early. Swaroop was the next batsman in but he was nowhere to be found. By the time he was located napping in the dressing room, blissfully unaware that a match was happening, Manoj had decided to step in, earlier than his usual batting position. It was a blessing in disguise because unknown to all of us, our skipper was going to rewrite history. Unfortunately, his partnership with Mahendran was very short lived. Swaroop, fully rested and awake by now, arrived on the ground and gave much needed partnership to Manoj. Their alliance lasted longest. We were hoping for them to take it through till the end but Swaroop, feeling adventurous, tried to poke at a wide ball and got caught. The tension returned and we were back to our nail biting chore. With 5 wickets down, Shiv went in and tried to stop the fall of wickets. He succeeded for few overs but then was caught behind. We were doing OK with run rate but the fall of wickets was worrying us. Throughout the game, the opposition appealed for everything, LBW, caught behind, run out, probably even “out for breathing too loudly”, pressurising umpires to give us out in guilt. But our umpires, Mahendran and Amit, stood firm like Supreme Court judges, and gave out only when it was genuine. Opposition were not happy though (are they ever?). Anyways, Ritesh came in next and not only did he support Manoj, he also made quick and much needed runs. Somewhere in between, Manoj scored a century, his first one for the club. However, he had no time to rejoice as there was an uphill task in front of him, to win the game. While our skipper was on a roll and was continuously adding runs to our scoreboard, he was also counselling his partners when they were panicking after not making runs and required run rate was creeping up. He was reassuring them that if we keep holding on to our wickets, runs will come by; if there is a low scoring over, next one will be high scoring to even out. Manoj was doing a wonderful job as a skipper. After we lost Ritesh, next batsman was also out on duck. We were close, but wickets were vanishing like free snacks at a party. It was not only breaking the flow, we had only 2 wickets left to bank on. New batsman Aravind arrived with monk like calmness, refusing to give his wicket away. Meanwhile, Manoj was busy rewriting club history, overtaking every previous high scorer one by one. In the 39th over, he said enough was enough; let’s get it over and done with. He smashed few boundaries and made us win with 9 balls to go and 2 wickets in hand. Manoj: Century. Team: Relieved. Opposition: Still appealing and sulking. Moral of the story: If you want our batsmen to score centuries, just set the temperature to 30+ degrees. (Also refer Pinkneys Green vs Frimley Green Cricket Club - 24th May 2026)