DEBUTANT SLAYS WYVERNS IN GF REPLAY

by Ross Ferris

On a brilliant sunny day with Fuji providing a once again very scenic backdrop, the Wommies took on Wyverns in the first official match of the season. There was a pre-game shirt presentation to debutant Wombats Trenton, Gavin and Matt.

Captain Invincible Burke won the toss and elected to bat before he and Beathy strode to the crease to systematically dismantle the Wyverns attack. A partnership of 122 in 18 overs set up a perfect platform for us to establish an imposing total for the Wyverns to chase. Beathy was in great touch hitting three towering sixes to the long off region as well as cover driving and pulling with class. Burkey played a back seat role but showed enough to suggest he is in for a big season before he was dismissed for 32.

I joined Beathy for a partnership of 88 before Gavin was dismissed to a very sharp leg side stumping for a superb 118. Dino joined me and soon after I played a donkey shot, holing out to a terrific catch from the young Japanese fella dressed as a baseballer for 45. Curly and Dino (Heckyl and Jeckyl) enjoyed a loving and caring partnership of 18 with Mars Bars calling out to Fast Cars and Fast Cars telling Mars Bars to go and do the same. Dino pulled off one of his signature dummy spits when he slapped out to cow corner only for Houdini to raise one hand, take a classic catch and then miraculously produce the ball from behind his back…a great catch enjoyed by all…except the seething Chiangmai Dinosaur. “F&#$ing showpony $#@!”.

After Reggie received a sandshoe crusher and a black toe first ball he looked up to see the umpire’s finger raised. Wickets fell quickly with the tail proving to be decidedly longer than what you would expect from the standard Australian marsupial. Killer and Rayos managed to block out the last over possibly taking the captain’s instruction of seeing out the overs a little too far when Rayos turned one to fine leg for a possible two runs only to hear a “NO” call from Killer and the batsmen stood their ground. 7 for 242 off the allotted 40 overs.

Rayos and Curls opened the bowling but didn’t manage to break the Wyverns opening partnership. Curly bowled a very accurate spell however to eventually finish with 1/25 of 8 overs, beating the bat many-a-time. First change saw Al Koolhof get the breakthrough with the batsman chopping on. The very next ball, the momentum swung the Wombats way even further with the new batsman clean bowled.

One highlight of the day was Dino’s one handed horizontal catch diving in front of Burkey at first slip off Curly’s bowling. Matt Stride and Beathy both bowled some good line and length at times with Beathy picking up two clean bowleds. Matt decided he didn’t like the look of the muscle top on Dino’s mate and bounced him twice only to see two of the cleanest and longest pull shot 6’s you would ever want to see. Burkey was nice enough to throw me the ball when the tail arrived. I was supported by some great catching from Killer (AKA John Dyson play of the day) and Al to finish with 4 wickets.

Trent finished the innings off with his first Wombat wicket and the Wommies were home by 60 runs in an impressive start to the season with some quality players to come back into the side.

The van ride home was riddled with Changmai “cricket” stories, identification of lady boy features and Killer needing a pit stop every 10 minutes. Chu-Hi filled the esky which was somehow empty when we arrived back at Harajuku. Rayos and Beathy went back to their youth on the locals’ skateboards until general consensus persuaded Beathy to give it a miss as it appeared highly likely he was going to cause himself some serious damage.

Great start to the year Wommies and an enjoyable day on many levels for all.