London Erratics Cricket Club

Founded 1974 for recreation and refreshment

Saturday 16 September 2006
London Erratics v Kilndown & Lamberhurst
at Kilndown

Cakes and ale
(Twelfth Night, Act 2, Scene 3 — Sir Toby Belch)
Click on (Þ) symbol for photo images
LONDON ERRATICS — batting 4s  6s 
Rivington caught 6    
Ward A caught 6 1   
Khawaja bowled 62 8   
† Coetzer bowled 2    
Eltringham c & b 30 3  1 
Head NOT OUT  34 5   
Ward T run out 18 4   
* Andrews NOT OUT  0    
Down    
Brooks    
Langley    
178 for 6 dec
Fall of wickets:  1(WardA)–11, 2(Rivington)–16, 3(Coetzer)–38, 4(Eltringham)–101, 5(Khawaja)–121, 6(WardT)–173
2006 marked the twentieth anniversary of Robert Waller’s recruitment of a team to play as The President’s XI against the club at the Kentish Weald village of Kilndown; since 2003 the preponderance of London Erratics has led to acceptance of the match into the records, which is just as well, as the third win in successive years was only the fourth Erratics victory this season.
As before, there were two other contributing clubs: Richards Down and Langley came from the Bank of England; and there were three Priory Panthers, who are based near Purley — Ed Coetzer and two debutants, Adrian Ward and Tom Brooks. Robert tries to introduce new Erratics to this attractive game, and this year Matthew Eltringham was playing for the first time. The website editor asked for the report of the game to be shorter this year, so there will be no further mention of James Rivington’s contribution. Everyone else deserves credit in what turned out to be another tense and exciting game. [Get on with it — Ed]
After what skipper Peter Andrews described as ‘a bad toss to lose’, the Erratics/Mayhew XI faced a testing task batting first, with pace and bounce obtained from a drying pitch by the village opening bowlers, especially the tall Matt Tye (who had played for us in 2002), who took the first three wickets. Adrian showed that he was a batsman of high class before being well caught at slip. The openers were removed with 16 on the board. This was not quite the situation for Ed Coetzer’s pinch-hitting, but he accompanied Nasir until the score reached 38. There followed what may have proved to be the decisive partnership, as Matthew joined Nasir to see off both the opening bowlers and what Peter identified as ‘the demons in the pitch’ (Þ) .
By the time Matthew (Þ) was out, the need now being to push the scoring rate on, 38 for 3 had become 101 for 4, self-doubt had been exorcised, and the balance had shifted. Nasir (Þ) completed a well-paced fifty (the only one of the match), before falling to a useful slow left armer. The good work was continued by Tristan (Þ) with a swift 18 (run out for the cause) and Jim (34*), who pushed the final score up to a very respectable 178, a level which has previously generated very tight finishes in this game. It was probably not a good idea for Kilndown to bring back their openers, now our captain had chanted mystic imprecations over the pitch (and we had our eyes in). Peter batted in the last over and claimed that he had hit one of his leg byes, but was cheated out of this by the (Erratics) umpire being intimidated by a glare from the (Erratics) scorer beyond the third man boundary. On this note of internal harmony we took tea.
Peter had personally unloaded the sausage rolls from a van parked well within the boundary before tea and declared them to be excellent. We are not sure if anyone else ate any. For these and all other hospitality from cakes (at tea) to ale (before and after match) we must thank Lord Mayhew, who supplied a stream of what Gibbon called Liberal Donatives, even though he is a Tory of the old school (Tonbridge).
KILNDOWN — batting
1   b Langley 21
2   b Head 23
3   b Down 15
4   st Coetzer b Down 9
5   b Down 17
6   c Rivington b Ward T 0
7   not out 40
8   run out 0
9   c Rivington b Ward T 23
10   lbw b Head 6
11   c Head b Ward A 0
163 all out
Fall of wickets: 1–47, 2–67, 3–89, 4–92, 5–92, 6–93, 7–122, 8–145, 9–160, 10–163

LONDON ERRATICS — bowling
Brooks 5 0 22 0
Langley 6 0 39 1
Down 11 2 38 3
Ward T 8 0 39 2
Head 3.4 0 19 2
Ward A 2 1 5 1
The village team played their part by chasing the total aggressively throughout, and were never behind the run rate, which was turned into 4.7 per over by efficiency unusual for the Erratics in the field — we actually bowled our overs faster than the opposition. All the Kilndown batsmen hit out and they never shut up shop, giving both sides a chance. Although Tom had shown that we too could bowl sharply, after 9 overs they were 47 for 0, before Richard Langley took a vital first wicket.
Peter then turned to his quartet of spinners for the rest of the game. Richard Down was accurate throughout and took the next three. Tristan also turned it dangerously and accounted for two more. When the last 20 overs started, Kilndown had only needed 96 with eight wickets in hand. The wickets then fell regularly, but if anyone had stayed with Tye (40*) they certainly had time to win. Peter turned to his secret weapon, Jim, who, unexpectedly like the Spanish Inquisition, always finishes the job off. However the win was always in doubt. There was a little of everything. A nine-year-old boy helped take the score from 145 to 160. The opposition captain (No. 2), who had retired hurt ‘in need of a chiropractor’ returned at the end, sportingly vouchsafing a runner.
There should be a few words for Ed, mainly a bowler though currently injured, who kept wicket. He took a very sharp stumping, demoralised the batsmen with a stream of loud and guttural Afrikaans (despite the fact that he was the only person on the field, or perhaps within twenty miles, who understood it), and conceded no byes. Finally, an exemplar of captaincy from Peter, who showed that everyone can be given a game, and still a close finish and a victory can be engineered. The man is really a lemma tart among leaders.
The game ended as a contented blanket of slightly misty dark closed in on the ground from the leafy hills around, closing a perfect early autumn day. This may or may not be a metaphor for the career of the Erratics cricket club itself.
[RW]
Erratics won by 15 runs
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