Arrived at the Worlds End ground at 1.15pm where "Big Bobby" was opening the gates , very early for a New C game. He announced to me and Dan that he had something in the back of his car for us. As we parked up and approached Bobby's boot with some trepitation we were presented with " Sachin's Plank" that had been left behind the previous season. ( It must be noted that Sach's batting has improved beyond belief since he deliberately left his bat in those changing rooms ). A slow trickle of New C players to the arena meant that we started 20 minutes behind schedule and somewhat surprisingly all Aldenham players were ready for a 2 o clock start except the normally reliable Vintage who arrived at two and thus incurred the first and only fine of the day.
Char won the toss and inserted New C , that included both Vince and Fabian Farley. What then followed was an Aldenham Catching performance the that has only been seen in that "Magners" advert with 9 catches from 9 chances. This procession was started by Messrs Whitehead and Knight senior , you knew the catch completion was totally unexpected by your team-mates as all 10 run towards you with their arms in the air!! 4 wickets for Chewett , 4 for a near fit-again Char and two for Tim Hale reduced New C to 132 all out. Fabian Farley out for just a few but Vince Farley hit 64 n.o. which included the biggest 6 i have seen when it hit the roof of a house some distance from the boundary. As we left the arena it was pointed out that in the last two visits to New C we have been struggling at 30 for 7!!
After tea Sach and Chris M opened the Aldenham innings against both Farley Juniors ( It is not advisable to remove Fabian early from his innings as this tends to add to his own fire!! ). Some early shot playing from the two batsmen , who were looking to get off strike took Aldenham to 25 before both Chris ( 10 ) and Sach ( 7 ) departed in quick succession. This bought the unlikely pairing of the new old men of Aldenham Vintage and Jerry ( complete with a no vision helmet for the first time ) to the wicket. What followed was the sight of a senior batsmen refusing singles so he didn't have to face Fabian and an eccentric batsmen swishing outside his off stump for 25 minutes to deliveries that were already in the wicket-keepers gloves. With the score on 46 both Vintage ( 2 ) and Jerry ( 11 ) perished to the docile pace of Vince. This bought Karan ( i will judge your ability here today ) Barot and Itty 6 Haque out to the middle. A vintage Aldenham partnership was then witnessed with Karan monopilizing the strike and Itty when allowed to face , playing his shot. These Aldo heroes saw us to virtually over the line , until Itty swung across the straight one and was out LBW for 27 ( no it wasn't a dickster decision!! ). Char came to the wicket and despite every opportunity to expose the tail , which included Dan Knight at 10!! , saw Aldenham home with 11 overs to spare.