Tilford 15 September
SCCC 186-8 dec
Tilford 96
Won by 90 runs

A glorious late summer day at beautiful Tilford started for some with lunch in the child unfriendly Barley Mow, but for the second successive week we were embarrassed by having only six players present at the scheduled start time and a mysterious no show. Stand up Kirk West wherever you are.

Informed that we were batting first, Wright chopped the second ball of the match onto his stumps and Hogben played all round a straight one to his fourth ball leaving us 5 (extras) -2. Seeckts (8) briefly flattered to deceive, Andrell (32) pinged some short stuff into the car park over the short boundary and Streeter batted like a man who is getting married this weekend. His fine 61 dug us out of the mire but at 97-6 it still didn't look clever with a tail - Greenhough at number 7 on merit - batting more in hope than expectation.

Once again Cryptic grit was shown as Nick Pow (30*) and Tom Ware (21) took full advantage of some declaration bowling. The injured Ware only stepped in at the last moment and was delighted to increase his aggregate for the season to..... er....... 21 runs from four innings.  The champagne moment of the Cryptic innings was Mark McLoughlin's blistering straight drive (also his first runs of the year) which was  worthy of Doug Walters, whose name adorns Mark's bat. Dear old Blamphers had a pointless journey from Northampton again.

Pimms was served for the drinks intervals, and beer with tea. Little wonder the pub landlord got a bowl, albeit a 15 ball over, and a bat at No. 5, albeit a painful duck.

Enter the familiar figure of Ross Greenwood who, having announced on Radio 5 that he got carted last week in the now regular 'Wake up to the Cryptics' slot, took a wicket in each of his first four overs leaving Tilford reeling. He ended with 5-19. Again Mark McLoughlin went wicketless at the other end, leaving Greenhough and Blamphin to clean up and find some vital pre-tour form. Jimmy still has enough venom in him to necessitate post match bridge building and Blamphers' long drive home was all pleasure with the scalps of Watership Down to his name.

So with 9 overs to spare we jingled our bells. Some locals thought we had killed the game but the book says we won convincingly and that Big Jim pouched two top catches, Pippa one and Greg got a stumping off guess who.

Readers will be pleased to know that the Players' Wives section of the site will be live imminently.

Cove 8 September
Cove 224-5 dec
SCCC 173-9 (all 9)
Lost by 51 runs

Conference fixtures have thrown up all sorts over the years, but rarely have we visited such a fine club as Cove in respect of ground, pitch, pavilion, teas, sponsors logos and (this was the catch) youth policy. If the quality of a cricket team bears any relation to the amount of writing on their clothes, this was a team to be reckoned with. Embarrassed by the mysterious non appearance of Rizwan Sheikh and David Grindrod we borrowed the opposition captain for a 10-a-side game, negotiated a batting second situation without use of a coin and watched the Cove openers carve Greenwood in all directions.

It was quickly apparant that Cove would score as many as they wanted off whatever bowling was offered so eight bowlers were used and some ugly figures will appear in the also bowleds of the averages. Birthday boy Pippa 2-0-26-0. Pilot Pat Hicks 1-0-14-1. Ouch. Greenwood's 6-0-53-1 will get lost in his rather better figures from the rest of the season.  Goss with 8-2-28-2 was the only survivor as 224 came from 36 overs. Special mention of Dwight Cupit's first stumping for the club, another mug falling for Jimmy's lack of pace.

Birthday boy was smartly caught at short leg for 3, makeshift opener Greenwood chopped on for 6 while the pinch hitting burly Welsh form of James John clouted a face saving 38. Pippa, his runner, slipped and injured herself, almost requiring a runner's runner. Ringer Matt Smith chipped in with 26, the newlywed Puppy Ware got a straight one before scoring and Cupit drew back his bow only far enough to spoon it to extra cover.

At 84-6 with 140 required and 18 overs remaining Seeckts emerged from the hutch to join Hicks. 8 an over was unlikely without a few risks being taken but a Claygate 2000 style victory still looked possible with 70 needed from the final 8 overs. Goss replaced Hicks (15) but lacked the captain's ambition (and timing). Cove's nerve was tested by Seeckts' belligerent 62, taken from about 40 balls with strokes all round the wicket, classical driving and twinkling footwork to loft the ball straight enough to knock paint off the sightscreens at both ends. When Seeckts was sawn off by a miraculous catch, Goss managed to get to the strikers end, and get out before the unfortunate Greenhough faced a ball.

We lost the cricket in good style but would have won the Tug-of-War easily, being a good 4 stone a man heavier (and twenty years a man older) than the opposition.

Headley 1 September
Headley 190-7 dec (43 overs)
SCCC 191-5 (36.1 overs)
Won by 5 wickets

The now habitual slaughter of Headley was repeated in glorious conditions, and in front of a reasonable crowd after Ross had managed to promote the game on his Radio 5 breakfast time business slot on Friday. His inflamatory language, using terms such as 'grudge match' and 'never without incident' ensured the deckchairs were packed by the time he arrived in the sixth over of the match.

The captain's decision to insert Headley looked good when Mark McLoughlin, using a new ball for the last time, found the edge with his second ball and Andrell held on to the catch behind. "No ball" called the umpire. Fourth ball the same batsman chopped onto his stumps but again the umpire had called Mark for overstepping. The umpire was nephew Andrew McLoughlin and the old chap ended wicketless. They travelled home separately.

For the first 80 minutes we looked a proper cricket team as Goss, McLoughlin and Greenwood bowled exceptionally well with up to 6 men around the bat as Headley edged their way to 61-4. Andrell took a blindingly acrobatic catch before a more regulation one, the rest were bowled, Greenwood ending up with 13-4-37-5, and Goss as good but less lucky with 10-3-15-2.

Blamphin and Greenhough then quickly got Headley back in the game with some canteen bowling that Harmsworth slogged without mercy.

Wright took six from the first over after tea but perished for 12 shortly after in a rare bid to get after the bowling. Streeter's strokeplay for 33 was typically stylish as he took a single from the sixth ball time and again. Andrell actually lost form mid innings, so little of the strike did he get. His 67 had everything, classy cuts and drives, solid defence, filthy dropped catches behind and in the deep, desperate running, consecutive sixes, and finally a yorker when he expected a short one. On balance it wasn't pretty but it set up the win which was secured by Andrew and Goss with 17 balls to spare.

Champagne all round followed as we celebrated Mark's testimonial / retirement in the company of the several former Headley players and, happily, Ross will have to inform his radio audience that the day passed without incident.

Claygate 18 August  
Claygate 228-7 dec
SCCC 203-6
Match drawn

It was credit to all present that the Cryptics looked far better on grass than on paper, a complete turnaround from the first month of the season. A team made up of nine bowlers - some of whom would describe themselves as allrounders -  a wicketkeeper / batsman and a captain somewhat under the weather, did not have high hopes of chasing a big score.

Selection difficulties saw to the imbalance in the side which included the return after 5 years of a prosperous looking Paul Neate. Entrusted with the new ball, he rolled back the years with an accurate spell of 9-4-17-2 as Claygate struggled to cope with irregular bounce in the opening hour. McLoughlin laboured without reward from the other end before late arrival Greenwood joined the fray, entertaining all with some emotional reactions to the batsmen's good fortune. The bowling was unimaginatively shared among eight players before the declaration after 46 overs.

Consider this batting order: Greenwood, Greenhough, Cupit, Seeckts, Donald, B-W, West, Andrew, Neate, Hicks, McLoughlin.  With four Aussies it sounded more than it looked like Hayden, Langer, Ponting, the twins etc

Jim (5) got a straight one early, Dwight (26) scored a 5 before being run out by Greenwood who had set about his work with characteristic vigour and forged a respectable partnership with Seeckts (25) when the last 20 overs started with 130 required. Narrowly avoiding a jug with 46, Ross ensured that several others got a bat, notably debutant Scott Donald who stayed to the end for 31, Brooke-Webb who was cleaned up for 81 less than last time, and Kirk West who has yet to play in a losing Cryptic team. PAJ Andrew smote four fours near the end but it was too late and another club first was achieved when stumps were drawn with an over remaining. It is doubtful that Claygate would have taken 4 wickets, equally so that we would have scored 26 runs.

Extras chipped in with 39 so everybody contributed on a day when it might all have been so different.

Ottershaw 4 August
SCCC 120-7
Rain. Match abandoned as a draw.

Ottershaw opted to insert the Cryptics on a very green and wet pitch, quite the opposite of the belters we are accustomed to at Havant on this weekend most years. Batting required immense patience to cope with naggingly accurate (though rather gentle) bowling and some unpredictable bounce and deviation.

It is no secret that Cryptic batsmen do not habitually display the required level of patience and concentration so to get to 55-1 and then 103-3 was commendable, Wright, Seeckts and Cupit all doing the right thing for a while. It was Big Jim Streeter who held the innings together with a brilliantly judged knock of 56 lasting 31 overs. After two weeks laid low by gastric problems, the lanky allrounder looked thinner than ever and required regular drinks. On another pitch his knock might have been worth 98, a point well made as we lurched to 109-7. The rain became heavy some time before the game was abandoned, as TV's Ross Greenwood continued his crafty assault on the batting statistics with another 5*.

140 was probably a winning total, we were stacked with bowling and, given the recent run of form, would surely have won. The day was otherwise noteable for James John's first game of the season in which he failed to get on the pitch but showed what a size 48 XXX long with XXX girth sweater looks like. Big.

Shackleford-sixes tournament 28 July

"Cryptics are red hot favourites" and "they were a class above the others" may have some in the club wondering whether the team has experienced some sort of acid flashback.

Indeed if your tastes in cricket run to cold, damp affairs played on soft tracks at a leisurely 2-runs an over, read no more. This was calypso-cricket, Cryptic style, played at the rate of two runs a ball and as aggressively in the field.

The Shackleford-sixes tournament was this year played in 30-degree weather and on a hard, fast track. The Cryptic ensemble of Blamphin, Brooke-Webb, Goss, Grinrod, Greenwood and McLoughlin (Andrew) played with a confidence and supremacy rarely experienced in the Club's history. The team was ably supported by manager Pip Wright and assistant manager Nick Pow (thanks boys or organising the free transfer of Goss from The Blues after he beat us here last year).

The 40-ball games brought forward some supreme performances: 87 runs in the first match against the gobby Charterhouse boys ("we only need to turn up to win"). That included 64644 out from McLoughlin; runs for both openers Goss and Brooke-Webb, Greenwood planted a ball over the barbeque and Blamphin, stone-walling at the rear whacked 15* from 8 deliveries. In the field the oppo were held to 42 with wickets down in the first, second and fourth overs - big catches held all over the field and other teams reassessing the required run rates.

Lunch a jolly affair as the Cryptics went large on the lager and the burgers.

In the second match against the Old Newts we tried chasing. We held them to 40 (three run outs - consider this Cryptics - three) and the McLoughlin pistol was kept in the holster as Goss and Brooke-Webb swept to victory by five wickets in the first ball of the fourth over.

The next test was home-side Shackleford. Brooke-Webb generously gave McLoughlin one over to face while Goss made a three over 50. The five over score was 82 and the home side failed to master the guile of Blamphin and Grinrod and gave scarcely a whimper.

Afternoon tea and the Cryptics changed to the barrel of ale, but the form in the final was not diminished.

The Cryptics played their earlier foes, the Charterhouse boys, and early tight overs from Greenwood and Grinrod - together with fine fielding - kept the boys at just 7 from two overs and 18 from three. They finished with the inadequate total of 37 - Blamphin on a hatrick confirmed his status as bowler of the day. Goss's performance of running twice around a falling ball off his own bowling before missing it completely may have had something to do with the rapidly diminishing keg, or the setting sun, but his attempt at a one-hander next ball was impressive, if inconclusive. The Cryptics set about the task with the confidence of having Goss and McLoughlin opening for the side. A few lusty blows later they were back in the pavilion and Grinrod, Greenwood and Brooke-Webb completed the task with a few flutters.

A round of jingle bells, the the silver-ware (ok, small cricket bats) was handed out and it was back to the pub for celebrations. A great day out in the sun for all Cryppos.

Victorious team at Shackleford-sixes