Mixed fortunes for Village teams.

Stoke Gifford’s two teams experienced very different results on Saturday 14 June.

The first team travelled to Barrow Gurney and fielded first.

Thanks to some wayward bowling, especially from Lamber who conceded 80 runs in his 12 overs the village struggled.  Dan ‘Five Bellies’ Dunt picked up a few wickets later on but the damage was done with Barrow running up 280 runs.

The break for tea was marred when yours truly was given a bollocking by the home side’s gobby wicket keeper for helping myself to a slice of cake after being invited to help myself by the home team players. “That’s for the players!” he snapped, his argument slightly dented when at the end they were forced to put two trays of uneaten food in the bin.

Lamber atoned for his miserable bowling performance by top scoring with 37, with support from Dunt.

However, it was an excellent partnership between Ian ‘I’m a far better player than my brother, honest’ Semple (25) and drunken layabout student ‘Nigel’ Johnson (25) saw the visitors scrape 161 runs.

However, the stiffs managed to win.

Despite, or perhaps because, of the inclusion of John Dunt, red faced Paul Long and the Sheriff, the Civil Service team scored a creditable 227.  Luckily, veteran all rounder Mark ‘Cleft Foot’ Stephens took an unlikely seven wickets.  Calum Meaney May Morph managed to drop a simple catch that my grandmother could have caught – and she died 30 years ago.

Longy smashed an excellent 70 but the wickets started to tumble before Martin ‘God’ Black (20) and Lewis Jefferies (19) steadied the ship.

The collapse continued with Stefan Johnson scoring another duck and when Morph was out for three it looked all up for the village.

Stephens had other ideas and scored 50 and Dunt (14) and the Sheriff (36) managed to see the Village home with the latter clubbing a six to seal victory in the last over.

The man of the match was a simple choice.  For his great all round performance, Morph picked up the award yet again.