Mallards took to the pitch on a glorious early May evening. The sun was already casting long shadows across the pitch as Cleaver came barrelling out of the sun like a Spitfire pouncing on an unsuspecting Fokker (nothing to do with Stan Boardman). The Wearmouth openers give a good account of themselves scoring freely before Bell clean bowled Ram for 16 as he attempted to play across the line. Cleaver ended his spell with figures of 4-0-0-29 and Bell with 4-0-1-25. The runs continue to flow until Cox speared a ball into Pavan’s stumps. Meanwhile at the other end Ajay took only 6 balls (there were a few wides) before finding the pitch and knocking over Kyle with a classy caught and bowled. Two more batsmen came and went (Venki and Kannan) bowled by Cox and Ajay and so the score moved onto 93-5. In the next and final over of Ajay’s spell we witnessed a fine display of the fast bowlers art, Bisu fended off a ferocious delivery straight into the bucket hands of L. Latif and Fadil was clean bowled, Ajay ending on an excellent 4-0-4-17 with Cox also bowling well on 4-0-2-22. With the strike batters back in the hutch, the task of sweeping up the tail was left to Latif and Ankush. Thanvka was the first to fall, frustrated with Latifs looping deliveries he top edged a dolly back to the bowler. Amal and Shami were soon taking that longish walk back to the pavilion, Ankush ending with a very commendable 2-0-1-1 and Latif 2-0-2-13. The final score 113 posted by Wearmouth and so 114 to win, what could possibly go wrong?
Ankush and Ayush strolled out to the wicket (they also strolled a few singles) and proceeded to play a mixture of aggressive boundary hitting with low risk singles to keep the score board ticking over. At the end of the 8 th over, Mallards were 50 without loss and up with the scoring rate. Ayush fell in the next over, bowled by Pavan for 10. In the same over Ankush retired on 30 and so Mallards had two new batsmen at the crease. Khalid Latif (Mallard new recruit and brother of Liaquat) and Ajay both advanced the score before Khalid was ran out and Ajay was caught behind whilst playing at a wide ball. The score 76-3 in the 14 th over. Still above the run rate with wickets in hand, surely Mallards couldn’t throw this away? Out strode Cox and McCaffrey to steady Mallards nerves, hitting boundaries seemingly at will (two 6’s and three 4’s) whilst also respecting the good ball. Both batsmen fell to the wily bowling of Kyle. And so at 109-5 Latif and Buckley entered the fray to steer the good ship Mallard into port in the 19 th over and clinch Mallards 2 nd win in 4 games. Liaquat Latif provided pakoras in the bar afterwards with an excellent mint dressing which were soon finished off and ended an enjoyable evening.