League Week 3 - 11th May

[vj]

4's Team to play Melrose at Roseburn, on Saturday (11/05).

Team in no particular order -

Chris West
Darryn Kidd
Gurdit Singh
Gurjeet Singh Landa
Ian Shiels
Prasad Selladurai
Robert Fotheringham
Rob Hayward
Sunny Verma
Touqeer Khān
Vijay Kumar

Please reach ground by 12 noon.

Best of Luck to all Teams!

[wheels]

BATMAN, ICEMAN AND SPACEMAN ARE MUFS SUPERHEROES

An outstanding captain's innings from Batman, a fine all-round display from Spaceman Asif and yet another crucial, nerveless batting performance from Jasir – hereafter known as Iceman, for the purposes of this slightly contrived superhero theme – rescued MUFS 1s from a seemingly hopeless position to secure a vital win over Musselburgh at Academy Park.

The prospect of playing cricket at all looked pretty bleak at 12pm as we watched the rain fall and an already soft pitch become squelchier by the second. But both captains were keen to play cricket, and the rain relented as forecast (big up to Hawkman and his Met Office homies), allowing us to start a 40 overs per side game at 2pm.

Despite having won our first two games batting first, the temptation to have a bowl on the wet pitch must have been huge; but Batman (via Sam, his stand-in tosser) stuck to his guns and decided to bat after calling correctly, knowing that the track was likely to cut up during the afternoon. It was what Sir Humphrey in Yes, Minister might have described as a “courageous” decision – and when Verma yorked Adnan for 9 and Farooq nicked a lifter from Collins to depart for 5, it looked braver still.

Worse was to follow as Luke also received an unplayable ball from the impressive Collins and was caught behind for 10, before Amol was more than a little unlucky to be given out LBW (we think) to Verma for 3, leaving the MUFS 38 for 4 and drifting rapidly up a well-known creek while lacking a crucial piece of boating equipment.

We had a fair idea that the depleted visitors were lacking in bowling depth, but for a while it looked as if this wasn't going to be an issue. But with Asif combining solid defence with some gigantic hits, including a glorious straight six off Ullah, we saw off the dangerman Collins (8-2-24-2) without further damage, and we dared to hope that a MUFS revival was underway.

Unfortunately, it wasn't – yet. Richardson replaced Collins and quickly grabbed the wicket of Beasty, caught flashing at a wide one for 1, then Sam fell to the same bowler for 3, his powerful lofted drive holding up in the wind and being very well pouched by Collins at long off. All now seemed to depend on the Spaceman; so when Burton came on to bowl his flighted off-breaks, the watching MUFS crossed their fingers and whispered, “Have a look, Asif”.

He did just that; but unfortunately, he was halfway down the track at the time, and was easily stumped off Burton's second ball for 36, leaving us 80 for 7 with over 16 overs remaining. It looked a certainty that we'd fail to bat out our overs for the third week in succession, but this time with a far less competitive total on the board. With the in-form Jaz coming in at 9 to join Captain Batman, all was not lost; but with only Tom and N-Dogg to come, everything seemed to depend on the two men at the crease if we were to reach a half-competitive total.

We ended up doing rather better than that, thanks to a genuinely outstanding eighth wicket partnership under huge pressure. Iceman Jaz (25) continued his tremendous form with the bat, keeping out the good balls and punishing the loose stuff with powerful cuts and drives. And Batman managed to curb his naturally attacking instincts – quite possibly for the first time ever – in a true captain's knock of 32 not out: not the biggest score he's made for the club, but surely his best and most important innings. With Tom (9*) leaving (i.e. missing) the ball with careful judgement, before finally managing to connect with a couple in the closing overs, a handy 24 runs were added in an unbroken 9th wicket partnership, and we finished on 149 for 8 from our 40 overs – at least a par score on a tricky, lifting pitch, and way above what we could have expected when wickets were tumbling earlier in the innings.

Ullah (8) and Gatner (19) got the Musselburgh run chase off to a confident start, adding 23 for the first wicket, but when Sam's ever-accurate, nagging bowling led Ullah to slice one to Iceman at cover, we had the breakthrough we needed. And as all good captains know, when you smell blood, it's time to call on the Beast.

True to form, Richie's first ball pitched halfway down and clanged into new batsman Ahmed's helmet before he'd quite worked out what was going on. He never looked confident after that, and it was no surprise when he failed to pick up a full delivery in Beasty's next over and was plumb LBW for 2. Tufail then opened his account with a six, but chopped on to the raging Beast soon afterwards.

After this fine, fierce spell from Richie (5-1-13-2), Yelly (2-22) replaced him and removed the stubborn and capable Richardson for 5, well caught by Farooq at slip, followed by the ever-dangerous Collins, excellently caught at long-off by a delighted Sam to avenge his own dismissal. But the game was far from over, with Burton combining a homespun technique with extraordinary timing down the ground to keep the visitors up with the run rate.

Batman, though, proved to be as canny with his bowling changes as he'd been with the bat in his hand. He quickly saw the benefits of taking the pace off the ball; though Tom decided to take things an unnecessary step further by taking the line and length off it as well. But with Spaceman (2-29) snaring Gatner and Verma (courtesy of another two stunning slip catches from Farooq) and Tom dismissing Burton for 38 with a leg-side quicker ball that the batsman somehow managed to sweep on to his own stumps, it was left to the hobbling Farooq to clean up the tail with outstanding figures of 2.2-1-1-2.

So Musselburgh were dismissed for 107 in the 32nd over, giving MUFS a 42-run victory that at various points looked highly unlikely to happen. Thanks to our visitors for a fun and competitive game, and congrats to the whole MDAFS team for making it three wins out of three this season.

Several players did their bit, including Beasty, Yelly and Farooq, as well as the aforementioned superheroes. But in particular, a massive well done to Batman for an outstanding captain's performance: a brave but correct decision at the toss; excellent management of his bowlers and field placings; and most of all, a skilful, sensible innings that turned the game in his side's favour.

(And if you'd told me three years ago – or even three weeks ago – that I'd ever find myself typing a sentence like that last one, I'd have said you were a complete lunatic.)

Edinburgh Accies await next week as we look to make it four out of four. In the meantime, I've only got one important thing to add.

UP THE MUFS!!!