Brian Mollet
Shand series cricket took on shades of deliverance on Sunday as the competition’s most red-necked teams, Left Bank and Main Arm, faced off in the battle of the boondocks.
You could almost smell the fried chicken and hear the banjo music as Scruff of Left Bank called correctly at the toss and chose to bat with conditions perfect and Lomath Oval glowing like a giant flat screen preset to ‘permanent retinal damage’.
Scotty (33no) and Scruff got things moving early, shelling the adjacent netball courts as they thumped 53 off the first 30 balls and mined- scarred the opposition.
Bucko launched himself one-handed to somehow drag down a low hard hook from Scruff (28) off the bowling of son Lucas to complete the family dismissal and ease the onslaught. This rallied the Main Armers, who got the mindset right either side of drinks and reeled the scoring back thanks to Zac’s two scalps and some tidy bowling from James, who came along to spectate but was mercilessly press-ganged into the team, the Armers being not above the odd abduction.
Hamish (32) and Bruce (35) pulled off their own father-and-son act in the late overs to plump out the score to a well-stuffed 184.
In reply James (33) saw off Scotty’s (1/3) probing in-dippers then left the bowling looking like a street scene in Aleppo, bombarding the boundaries without fear of sanction.
Paddy Mac (30no) kept up the good vibes and with the ‘central scrutiniser’ Brian biffing a few at the other end to successfully squirrel away at the big total.
Lucas (33) kept his cool after being neatly sconned by a bouncer from the evil Scruff, working the ball around skillfully then lashing a huge six over mid off, the young fellow playing without fear.
The atmoshere was taut as a cheap banjo string heading into the final overs and the man to stand up was Eli (3/18) whose late wickets closed the Main Arm innings 12 runs short of the total.
Next week: Suffolk Swingers v the Byron Full-Tossers.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
