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This page provides immediate access to the latest results for season 2008. The above links, and the navigation bar to the left of the screen, also make it possible to get at the running results and match reports for the other seasons since this web site has been in existence, as well as the results for the seasons back to 1959. Seasons prior to 1988 do not include information about individual performances since full scorebook details have not (yet??) been input to the database for those years.

The match reports page makes it possible to see the reports from all games in the current season, not just the current one in the section below. To get at the reports you can either select the link in the menu to the left, or indeed in the text above, or click on the date and opponent details in the results table below, which should be a hyperlink directly to the report for that game.

Latest Match Report

View the scorecard of this game

[This report courtesy of Graham Ward, with extra indented contributions in a different font from normal by Steve Pitts]

The last game of the 2008 season brought a brand new fixture. The rebadged Chiltern Gypsies were this week’s host in the hamlet of Cadmore End, near High Wycombe.

The Indian summer continued into this weekend and a beautiful autumn day was spent in the leafy environs of Cadmore End Cricket Club’s quaintly shaped ground in the Buckinghamshire hills. When Jacqueline and I arrived there was a small cluster of Badgers (Mark, Ben, Ian and Bill) out in the middle admiring the greenness of the wicket and a large bird of prey circling above. None of us were sure what the bird was but a subsequent accidental discovery whilst searching for more info on Cadmore End suggests that it might well have been a red kite. We also proved our ignorance on the wicket front, all being in agreement that it looked like a good seamers track and that the spinners would be out of luck – jokingly stated as a ‘doubt that it will even turn on the fifth day’.

The Gypsies won the toss and were keen to put the Badgers into bat on a ground that sloped down towards the pavillion via some shot inhibiting long grass. The captain and chairman opened and made steady progress, until the former was adjudged lbw by a young umpire who admitted to being not entirely familiar with the laws.

Greggy, having another go up the order came and went and was followed by his son-in-law Bill Jenkins. Bill initially unable to claim the strike, played second fiddle to the chairman for the start of their partnership.

Then it happened. This match will always be remembered for that special moment that occurs once in a blue moon.

The bowler Lall bowled wide of off stump, slightly short of a length and then master technician Simon Fox, while in pain with a bruised coccyx, crashed the ball through cover off the back foot. The fielder set off in hot pursuit and with help from the long grass grasped the ball before the boundary. The rest of the fielding team, still mesmorised by Foxy’s gracefulness, especially while posteriorly hindered, had forgotten to man the bowler’s stumps. The fielder’s long throw back serenely passed the wicket and observing this oversight, the batsmen spotted another run to be had.

There was time to amble this single, and amble Foxy did. So much so that the bowler had time to aim a shy at the stumps with the chairman well out of his crease. The ball missed the stumps once again, and our trusty batting heroes needed no invitation to run another. The ball was collected by the fielder back on the cover boundary and returned to a newly manned bowler’s end. The result was an all run four via double buzzers.

No doubt Graham will be surprised but this is the first time that I have ever heard that term, and those as unfamiliar as I was might find some enlightenment in the Wikipedia entry for overthrow. I wonder if the term is Australian in origin although it isn’t an easy thing to search the web for given its fairly generic meaning in ordinary English and its regular use in relation to basketball, but the only other reference to a double buzzer that I can find in relation to cricket is in a match report for a Scottish club.

From there on the crowd were further entertained by an explosive innings from Bill. Having starting claiming the strike and now well set, he mixed power with timing and raced to fifty, just beating Foxy to the landmark. Simon was bowled after a tired shot and was replaced by Richard Ward. Richard’s first ball was squeezed down to square leg via the inside edge, and hesitation ensued. Unfortunately Richard was left with too little time to get to the bowler’s end and was short of the crease. Patrick was next up the ramp and he was happy to let Bill continue his onslaught and he ended the innings in style, bringing up a superb century and losing three balls in the process.

The third wicket partnership between Simon and Bill, worth 117 runs and amassed over just 58 minutes and 14.1 overs, is the third best in club history. It is probably worth recording that Foxy claimed afterwards that he only played the ugly smear, that resulted in his dismissal almost immediately after reaching fifty, because he had looked over to confirm that it was me doing the scoring and therefore he was unlikely to come off the field to discover that he’d only made 49, or later be docked a couple of runs when the scores didn’t add up ;-{)

The Black Caps came out after tea looking to defend a decent score. A sneaky look at the Gypsies scorebook would have shown a few matches where they came up short hanging on for a few draws, and the Badgers needed to be wary of this.

The Badgers were, on paper, light on bowlers for this match, and chose to open with Graham Ward and Ian Gregg. The first ball bowled by Graham, turned sharply and past the outside edge. The second ragged square, and drew oohs, aahs and gasps from all over. The Chiltern opener was living on borrowed time and seemed relieved when he was out to the sixth ball of the over – a dolly for the skipper.

Oddly those first two balls from Graham turned out to be an isolated occurrence, with the ball continuing to turn throughout the home side’s innings, but without ever achieving quite the same venom or change of direction. Fortunately for us, the more normal turn that Graham was able to extract from the pitch was more than good enough to bamboozle the home side.

A tight over from Ian followed and then in the third Graham found an outside edge and Steve Pitts was on hand to catch it, apparently with his elbow rather than with his gloves. Either way it brought up Steve’s 300th wicket keeping dismissal for the Badgers, comfortably a record.

Not long after Graham trapped the other opener plumb in front. So plumb in fact that Graham could tell you the angle at which the stump would have been laying on the ground had the pad not intervened. Height was never an issue either. Greggy then claimed another catch later in the same over stooping forward to bring up number four.

Graham’s ‘not long after’ here rather compresses what was probably the Gypsies best partnership since the third wicket actually added 38 runs in one ball short of eight overs with M.Gillett being the opening batsman dismissed leg before for 11 and Brightwell at the other end racking up 56. It may be that Graham is blocking out the less positive elements of his performance since the wickets fell in his sixth over, but the fifth was his most expensive at 17 with each of the subsequent three overs costing ten apiece. Oh, and for the record, I would have been highly aggrieved to have been given out LBW to that particular delivery, and got the impression that Mr. Gillett wasn’t too chuffed about it either.

Ian then got himself in on the act up the other end with a clean bowled, reward for his good tight control. For a period Brightwell started getting stuck into the bowling. Some powerful hitting was displayed and Graham in particular was despatched for a few, including a couple of maximums. However, Graham got his revenge when a miscued slog went high into the leg side. Greggy turned and chased, running at full speed, arms outstretched, and pulled off a truly memorable catch.

Another chance was offered at midwicket off Graham’s bowling and this time Bill Jenkins added to his good day by taking the chance, bundling the vice captain out of the way in the process. Graham was still getting decent turn and got through another Gypsy defence and only the ball colliding with the timbers prevented a stumping chance.

Ben Valentine by now had replaced the tired Greggy (1-30 from nine overs) and he too got one in the wickets column. Whether Foxy saw the ball before it stuck to his person is neither here nor there – either way, the Gypsies were nine down and staring down the barrel. Badgers’ fans didn’t have to wait for long and Graham flighted another one, and an unproductive swish of the bat later it was all over. Graham finished with his personal best figures of 8 for 65 and the Badgers had won by more than a hundred runs.

This was comfortably Graham’s best ever bowling performance for the Badgers, beating the 6 for 41 three years ago at Blindley Heath, and the best bowling figures for the club since Alan Tickner snared 8 for 28 against Merrow back in 2003.

So there you have it, the season ends with a blazing century, an eight wicket haul and double buzzers – what more could you ask for?

On a purely selfish note I could ask for one less extra during our innings. I set myself the target of scoring more runs over the course of the season than the renowned Xavier Tras but a lack of opportunity over the final two games, and a lack of skill with the bat over the other sixteen, left me one run short of that milestone. Now, that may seem like an odd target to set, but if I tell you that only two other Badgers managed the feat this year, that Pat is the only one to have bettered extras in each of the past five seasons, that Mark is the only other player to have done so over that span, that 1998 was the last time that as many as four Badgers did it, and that I haven't managed to outscore extras since the year 2000, then perhaps you'll understand why coming up one run shy is such a big deal to me.

Statistical Notes: As mentioned above Steve Pitts duly reached 300 dismissals, courtesy of a caught behind standing up to Graham Ward which lodged in the crook of his right elbow rather than nestling safely into the gloves, thus neatly summing up thirty years of Steve’s wicket keeping for the Badgers. I should also point out that Bill’s ton is the first century by a non-member, and to think we’ve always viewd him – especially in his role as scourge of many a Badgers net session – as a bowler rather than a batsman!!

Season 2008 Results

Current record: 9 wins, 6 losses, 3 draws

The current season's results are arranged in reverse chronological order, to make it easier to find the most recent games.