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FROM OUR MAN AT THE WHEEL OF THE RENAULT ESPACE IN THE TWENTY MILE TAILBACK ON THE A1Red bat stepped into Jimmy Saville's shoes and fixed it for Phil Jones by appearing live at Leeds at the weekend (with back up dates in York and Ilkley). Sadly the collective never got out of first gear (except in the bar) and signally failed to match the little man's organisational skills, despite being presented with a thoughtfully crafted fixture list in which it was perfectly capable of being competitive. Friday night was, in retrospect, perhaps too enjoyable for the nine bleary-eyed beer guzzlers who made it to the ground in Adel to face Cardigan Road on Saturday. In the fullness of time the other two other members of the side pedalled into view, united by a common belief in 2:30 starts and lycra-based fashion statements. Determined to distract attention from the two man Chippendales act on the boundary, gulley-for-the-day wiggy Lewis gave Redbat one of their few fillips of the match with a blinding catch to remove a dangerously burly opener off the gangling whirl of Danny Whitelock. As the buzzing crowd settled down again, it became apparent that Redbat were bowling on a pitch of two halves; one of them brown and crumbly and the other a bright seamy green. Persistent uneven bounce suggested that 150 would be a score that Cardigan Road should not be allowed to get. On the other hand, number 3's ability to crash long hops through the off side ring and past where the sweeper would have been if we'd thought of posting one seemed to be such an enjoyable sight that everyone wanted him to do it again (and again, and again). On another hand, if we are to break lifelong habits in search of individual and collective fulfilment, one thing we should we focus on is that it can't always be the bowlers' fault. And it certainly wasn't here. Certainly not Andy Lee's or Paul O'Connor's who both did creditable work hauling us back from the abyss our fielding kept trying to tip us into. Could we stop the ball on the ground? nope, not if we were going to try and do it by moving somewhere near that ball and waiting for some kind of mystery force-field to come and do the hard bit for us (Guilty parties: the entire cast, especially me). Could anybody cling onto a catch? Nope, not if your money's on Phil Jones, Lloyd Peters or Mike Redfern. OH YES HE CAN, if you took the generous odds available from most turf accountants on Anzaniman. He was probably thinking about treating himself to a polka dot jersey to reflect his hard-won King of the Mountains title in the Tour des Dales that had brought him to the ground, when a flashing cut sped towards him at backward point (yip, if South Africa needed Jonty Rhodes to do a job in a particular fielding postion, Redbat had the man to match him). To the undisguised glee of his team-mates the big man shot downwards and forwards to claw the ball away from the turf and send the batsman on his way with the unlikeliest epitaph ever to appear in a Redbat scorebook; Ct. Anzani, Bd. Redfern, bugger all. But even this could not lift the collective. The dark facilitator wheeled away a while with his loopy wiles but Redbat remained somehow at odds with itself and in search of its soul. One of my fondest memories is of being told by an opposing skipper that I was (amongst a large number of other, similar, things) "the spawniest little git I've ever played against". The gentleman in question was legendary in 1970s Essex for two things. One was almost Biggsian grumpiness when dealing with adult opponents (he once skied the ball to cover and set off for a run with the words "c'm on, that c**t can't catch"). The other, oddly, was a fair minded and encouraging attitude towards younger players. I was always rather proud that being dropped on 0, 1 and 47, by the same bloke (who, incidentally, was Paul Pritchard's dad), before being bowled by a no ball on 49 had reduced him to sledging a 16 year old playing aginst grown men. Now that may sound like a digression. If we are honest it does indeed have only a tenuous link with Saturday's events. But then again, I couldn't help thinking of the spawny bit when yet another competent but frankly limited batsman was gifted a maiden ton by the incompetent hands of RBCC and the collective found itself looking down the barrel of a target only just shy of 200. That was almost exactly 100 too many as the boys scratched their way into three figures but refused to budge any further. Only Lloyd Peters played his part in full with a gritty 32 which would have been perfect in support of a long knock from someone else but was never going to take us home on its own. Of the feasible someone elses only Andy Lee was (partially) blameless; he was pounding promisingly into the V when Wiggy called him for a impossible single which he should have disdainfully refused. No-one else in the top four could be very pleased with the way they got out, the wigged wonder compounded his sins by demonstrating that there is a way to look worse than a bloke who gets out to a girl's first ball (let her bowl you a couple of maidens and then get out to her) and the lads headed off into the Yorkshire sunset with plenty more to think about than who's round it was. Further doom and gloom follows in due course. Jon [While our regular correspondent's secretary is too busy to provide the next instalment, we present interim reports from rival sources.] Day two. We travelled to York, the ground was an attractive setting on the bottom tier of lawn in front of a Victorian asylum. We batted first, in lieu of regular openers (who had slept in) myself and Bruce opened, setting the tone for the afternoon we treated ordinary bowling with respect and scored not very many before getting ourselves out. In strode Jon and Biggs junior who went about the task of assembling a satisfactory target. If I recall corectly Jon scored 32 and Robin 33 with the highlight being a six over the bowlers head by Biggs The Younger, I don't recall much else about our innings except we batted through the 40 overs for 128, which was about 60 runs short of what it should have been. We took the field, with a limited bowling attack depleted even more by Robin having what can only be described as a mare. With much chuntering from various parties we capitulated in a trice, Oh and I took a catch. The opposition were nice blokes and it was a really good fixture, we drank in a shite pub, then in a friendly little local "The Wellington". Went back to Ilkley, Drank loads more. Then my personal highlight of the tour The John Anzani Quiz. Thankfully I can remember no details. Please somebody take over at this point, it is all too painful. Dave
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