best ever score

By London Leprechaun
August 31 2011

London Leprechaun reports from Lord's on what turned out to be one of the best days of cricket for awhile. After she got over a few Techo problems , LL gives a vivid report on a days play that saw nearly 400 runs scored for just one wicket, and Andrew Strauss get a career best. Oh and the title DBM ( Does Bat for Middlesex)

The Morning

An inauspicious start to the day – with a less than helpful technical support (don’t you just love the press 1 for this and 2 for that and 3 for the other).  “So you have a problem with the website we host; not our problem – go pay someone else to fix it because we won’t help you although it is the way we host the site that is causing the issue.  Oh and thanks for your call your custom is so important to us.”

However such a start will not dampen the anticipation of what could be a pivotal few days in our season; the grey, cold skies will not put me off – I will just bring rather more layers than I had with me yesterday; even London Transport’s famous – “we are being held here to regulate the service will not put me off.”    And in spite of all that I still manage to get to Lord’s just in time for the first ball and to see that Leicester have put us in. Well it is cold, and cloudy and the wicket has a tinge of green.

It’s a quiet start – Strauss (our New Man for this match) and Sam Robson – clearly now a fixture in the side don’t score for four overs – but then they hardly have to lay bat to ball.  Almost the first ball Strauss has to play is a thunderous hook of Hoggard.  A quick single later and Middlesex are off and running.  And running and hooking and pulling, and driving and from nothing after four overs they are 20 after six and they don’t look back.  The score rattles along approaching four runs an over;  the batsmen take it in turns to race ahead of each other and then catch up;  the short boundary takes a pounding; the long one is not neglected either; Leicester go increasingly quiet; the bowlers rotate, but nothing goes their way.  And it becomes an increasing pleasure to sit and watch two Middlesex batsmen in prime form without any concerns or worries about silly shots or silly runs and to hear the very satisfying sound of shots played resoundingly of the middle of the bat.  One little incident sums up Leicester’s morning.  Naik comes onto bowl, Strauss drives his first ball quietly to cover, Wayne White who sounds like he should be in the wild west,  fields the ball, throws wildly to the bowlers end, no one backs up and a shot intended for nothing becomes four.  You could almost sympathise with them – we have been there not so long ago!

And so to lunch on 130 for none – oh for such starts throughout the season!  And then excitement as Middlesex players gather at the Pavilion steps, and after the announcer has told us about the luncheon (yes really) arrangements he kindly informs us that two players are to be capped.  John Simpson is clearly one, will Sam Robson be the other? But no it is Scott Newman. Which makes for interesting discussion over our lunchtime perambulation (does anyone use that word outside the Lord’s tannoy community?). 

The Afternoon  

Starts just as promisingly.  Our batsmen ease quickly and easily into this session; the score continues to rattle along and we can just imagine the voice of Geoffrey Boycott saying that his grandma could play the Leicester bowling.  We can imagine that Hoggard is thinking that his decision making this morning was a tad off the mark.  The batsmen match each other as they approach the magic three figures, but all of a sudden we have a wild swish from Strauss; followed closely by a thick edge from Robson – at about 2.30 we have the first really false shots from either batsman.  And there aren’t any more for the rest of the afternoon.

Andy Strauss is first to get close to the 100 mark, some trademark pulling and cutting get him to 99 and Leicester go for the usual ploy of coming in to deny him the single. The only trouble is that the offside is the very short boundary, and all he had to do was cut hard and the fielder who had come in could not stop the boundary. If he had stayed out he might have saved a single.  It really is not Leicester’s day!

Shortly after Robbo gets to 94, which has us all a bit nervous but he eases onto  95, then 96, then 97.  And then swiftly a hundred.  Which unfortunately was soon  overshadowed when he seemed to walk into a lifting ball from White – surprised perhaps by a bit of bounce – and got a nasty blow on the head.  Thank heavens for helmets but there was immediate concern from everyone.  Fortunately attention was swift, and though he seemed to want to carry on, he was persuaded off.  Happily he was walking OK so it may not be as alarming as it looked.  And with the score going as it is, he may well not need to bat again in this match.  And Tom Smith is a decent sub fielder.   So he can have a good rest hopefully.

So in came Jamie D for a few overs before tea – keeping the left/right hand combination or did Chris Rogers not fancy having to face Buck?  Jamie was in a very frisky mood, hitting quick boundaries of the rest of the White over, which dispelled any nerves that the wicket or the bowling might have suddenly found some venom.  And he continued in that vein to help take us to tea with a very healthy 271 for no wicket. Which led to all sorts of discussion about how record partnerships would be described if three people were involved. We had already broken the 1^st wicket record against Leicester when Sam was still batting, but we were close to the all wicket record against them , and the way we were batting the all time Middlesex 1^st wicket record was looking threatened.  (372 in case you are interested).

And in between all this we had almost forgotten that we had already picked up two batting points – two points closer to that magic number!

The Evening session

Three things dominated this session: 

1.  Andy Strauss getting his career best 1^st class score – he had been serene all day – knowing exactly which balls to hit and which to leave alone;  he played his trademark shots with venom, while  a straight drive for six was one of the highlights of a very special innings. For no logical reason, I was very pleased that his highest score is in Middlesex colours. And judging by the reaction of the crowd, others may have felt that way too!

2. A proper wicket fell.  Jamie D had continued in his very frisky mood after tea but maybe an over ambitious shot trying to get his 50 got him caught behind.  To his annoyance and everyone’s surprise.  And still Chris Rogers was avoiding Buck.  So it was left to Dawid Malan to come in and play some sumptuous cover drives as the batting points kept going.

3.  A ridiculous decision to come off for bad light with ten overs to go. Which if we had played might well have led to 200 for Andy and 400 by close of play. How could the light possibly be dangerous with the score at 370-1.  Absolutely daft.

The Conclusion

If my day started inauspiciously I wonder what happened to Matthew Hoggard before the toss. But then if Leicester had batted I doubt if they would have only lost one wicket all day.

This was as near a perfect day as we could have had today: we have put pressure on the other teams starting their matches tomorrow – I doubt it Northants or Surrey wanted to see this score; we are four points closer to the magic; we have seen Strauss at his serene best and an innings of sense and bold strokes from Sam Robson.  And it is only his injury which has put any kind of shadow over the day.  But he should have plenty of time to recover.

Roll on tomorrow!