Friday 23rd June 2023
Wick welcomed the Coach & Horses to the village green for a Friday night T20 match. Big thanks to the ground staff for producing yet another beautiful wicket.
At one point Wick had the luxury of having 12 players and with the Coach struggling to fill their 11 man roster we had the privilege of potentially lending a couple of players. Unfortunately Carl (Carlos) Jenkins had to pull out last minute so the dream of overfilling the squad never quite materialised.
With skipper Russ unable to play, Steve led the side for the first time. Wick welcomed back Morgan for his first game in a couple of seasons, unbeknownst to Steve when introducing himself to Morgan it turned out that Steve was Morgan’s old guitar teacher from back in the day. Also returning to the side for the first time this season was Tubsy, fresh with a few more grey hairs and more bags under his eyes than last season (baby number 2 can be blamed for that)!! Turning up separately than Gutsy the boys wondered had there been a falling out of some sort between the brothers .. let’s just say one brother took a suit not belonging to them to a Butlins weekender and used it as fancy dress as the Million Dollar Man Ted Dibiase without the other brother knowing. This then led to a conversation between the team about favourite WWF wrestlers; the majority went for Hulk Hogan or Macho Man, unfortunately for Paul he clearly showed his age by going for Big Daddy and Giant Haystacks.
The Coach won the toss and elected to bat. Paul opened the bowling from the swings end and started off well taking a wicket in the first over, Tubsy taking a catch at point. Amal opened from the Trepit road end bowling rapidly and was unlucky not to pick up a wicket. Next pair up to bowl was the Police House Express Gutsy, steaming in he was unfortunate not to pick up any wickets with the batsman edging a few up in the air but finding the gaps. Tubsy came on and bowled tidily picking up a wicket with stand in skipper Steve taking a sharp catch.
After losing those 2 wickets the Coach started to recover with the opening batsman & the Number 4 putting on a tidy stand. Steve called upon the partnership breaker Kenny to have a bowl, hoping he would weave his magic and pick up his customary wicket (more of this to come later on). It looked like Kenny was gonna get said wicket when Paul dropped one at point which led to a Kenny outburst ‘arghhh you bellend’!! bringing back his classic line from the Colwinston game last year. It just wasn’t meant to be for Kenny this time as he also dropped a difficult return catch off his bowling, although I won’t type what he called himself after that drop!!
Skipper Steve bowled at the end of the innings and was desperately unlucky not to pick up a wicket with a few hit and misses and the ball just missing the stumps. After 20 overs the Coach finished on 124.
Onto the Wick innings with Steve & Tubsy opening the batting and things got off to a bad start when Steve was bowled first ball. In strode Colin hoping to steer (get it he is a bus driver 
) the Wick innings in the right direction!! He started off well smashing a 4 off the opening bowler. However in the next over the steering came to an abrupt halt as there was a big appeal for a caught behind. Colin was unmoved and umpire Guts didn’t hear a thing. The next ball Colin edged behind and was given out this time, when walking off Colin did admit that he did actually edge the previous delivery behind, channelling his inner Stuart Broad. Lets hope he gets a warmer welcome back in the Coach than Broad did in Australia!
With the Wick innings having the potential to implode it was left to Amal & Tubsy to slowly re-build the innings finding boundaries hard to come by the pair did their best to rotate the strike and pick up 1’s & 2’s when the opportunities arose. Tubsy eventually did pick up a few boundaries but the overs ticked away and in an attempt to up the run rate was bowled on 24. This left Amal to pick up the pace and with the overs running out fast and the required run rate creeping up he was next to go caught trying to hoick one of the many left arm bowlers the coach possessed.
In strode Morgan & Iestyn to the wicket to get the run rate up, Morgan had hit one just wide of mid off and whilst no run was taken Morgan made it known that maybe there was a single there. Come the next ball, a similar shot and area to the previous one, Iestyn sprinted off calling a single and lo and behold Morgan gets run out. Iestyn hit some lusty blows including a six into the chapel and being chuffed that when you play in Wick its not 6 and out like in Colwinston which is how he was out last year! Iestyn was eventually out caught by the fielder on the boundary rope who he thought was one of the wick team just sitting on the roller prior to the ball being bowled.
As mentioned earlier the coach were short a player or two so like a cold war spy in a John La Carre novel, double agent Kenny was called into bowling by the coach’s skipper Kenny is somewhat like kryptonite to Wick batsman, always managing to get them out, and somewhat spurred on by the dropped catches and wicket less spell, he swinging the ball round corners, managing to bowl poor Chris first ball. This led Wick to get him replaced ASAP by Iestyn who then proceeded to bowl a couple of wides and, in his defence, he claimed he had bowled like this for Wick so it’s no different for you guys!! Owen and Paul saw out the last of the Wick innings, Owen scored some lovely boundaries and finished not out whilst Paul decided to run himself out on the last ball of the innings with Wick Finishing 86-8 in 20 overs.
A great game played in great spirit and a fixture we look forward to playing in the future.
-Rob Dixon
