St Andrews University Staff Cricket Club

Match Reports 2006

The distinctly dodgy early summer weather which we have endured this year had left this game in doubt right up until the scheduled meeting time. However, much to everyone's surprise, the match was on - played by necessity on Largo's Astroturf pitch, with a longish but not too damp outfield limiting the value of some shots.

The side contained an embarrassment of riches in the bowling department but was obviously lacking in batting depth, as well as being without a time-served wicketkeeper. As Captain Stan was taking the scenic route to the ground, Scott Richardson took and won the toss, elected to field and opened the bowling in tandem with Ben Agate. Scott produced a lovely spell of swing bowling, finishing with 8-3-11-1 and although Ben found some swing and seam, he struggled somewhat with the difficult uphill approach - a problem common to all those who bowled from the Forth End - he took an early wicket, well caught by Stan behind the stumps. With the first three wickets down for 45, things were going well, however a 78 run partnership between Twose and Ali took Largo to 123 before the Czech Republic's finest, Vit Matuska, tempted Ali into a tame drive to mid on. Ten runs later, Largo's opener Twose clipped Alex Smith to leg and Ben Agate took an excellent catch and the last five wickets went for 40 runs, the bulk from Arfan whose use of the short leg side boundary gave new meaning to cow corner! Anil and Vit both had little trips into the muddy field to retrieve the ball, before Anil extracted revenge, inducing a miscalculation from Arfan which presented Patrick Jess with a tricky high catch. Phil Jess and Matt Clarke switched ends and produced excellent results, polishing off the tail and returning figures of 5-1-11-2 and 7-1-25-3, respectively.

A good fielding display all round was led by stand-in 'keeper Stan who did very well but was barely able to walk off the field! Too many wides were given away which must be remedied in future - 26 extras from a total of 170. An increasingly welcome sight was 'Life' President Roy Dilley being released from the shackles of first slip to patrol, Jonty Rhodes-like, the cover region where his impression of a swooping panda was appreciated by all.

The usual excellent tea was provided by Largo and after an opportunity to catch up with familiar faces from the opposition ranks, the St Andrews reply commenced, with hopes high for a successful chase. These were reinforced by a bizarre and unfortunate start to the bowling by N Rintoul, the 18 year old Captain for the day, whose no ball problem led to two 11 ball overs and figures of 3-0-25-0 before he took himself off. His replacement, A. Ali, bowled a testing and accurate spell, taking a very sharp c&b off Roy and this complemented Largo's other opening bowler, Marshall, whose unchanged spell of 8-1-18-1 meant that runs were at a premium. Stan and Matt nevertheless put on 30 before Matt's watchful innings was terminated with the last ball of Marshall's spell and a clatter of wickets followed, as we headed to 87 for 6. Stan's excellent knock was cut off at 22 by a fortuitous c&b by Black whose persistence in bowling full and straight brought him a further 3 wickets, all clean bowled.

With the target looking distant, Ben and Patrick dug in and were able to rotate the strike, facilitated by Largo dropping the field back, aware that only boundaries could hurt them in the run chase. Good opportunistic scoring from Ben and an accumulation of singles produced a partnership of 59 and thoughts of an unlikely win but the need to move the run rate up to 7 an over proved impossible as Patrick chipped to mid off and the tail did not wag, leaving Ben stranded on an excellent 33 not out.

A total of 152 all out was below par, particularly as 31 were gifted as extras and we were clearly a batsman short, showing how much we will miss Stuart Robertson who takes off for the distant climes of Calgary, Alberta this week after 3 years as our hard working Fixtures Secretary. An engraved quaich was presented to Stu in recognition of his service to the Club and we will all miss him, particularly those laconic phone calls on a Sunday morning, "errrrrrrrr …………it's raining, it's aff.".