Report by Mike Harrop:

By some surprising quirk of fate both teams were assembled and ready for the skippers to go out and toss on time. "Captain" Cliff kindly allowed James Wyatt to conduct the toss and, although nobody was quite sure who won the toss, FASCC headed out to bat with Cliffy's generosity even permitting Predicta to choose the batting order. Both teams had an Aussie pro on board (more on this later) with Wilty B striding to the crease with Biggus Jimmus. Perhaps for the first time in FASCC history there were century stands for wickets 1, 2 and 3 - it was only when The Bear came in at number five did the average age of the combined batters fall below 100. The backbone of the innings was a magnificent 60 by Biggus Jimmus, including a second wicket partnership of 90 with Mike "The Ginger Ace" (36), Deaker's typically rapid 20 and a quick fire 50 by The Bear - his first FAS fifty (and, indeed, in all senior cricket). The question on everyone's lips was "is the mantle of senior cricketers in the family passing down a generation?" Nah, fat chance, given the comical, nay suicidal, calling and running between the wickets demonstrated by The Bear when he was joined at the wicket by Dare Senior. The nadir came when Bear hit a dolly to mid-wicket and then started berating Cliff for not scampering a single on the drop. Somehow the innings was declared with FASCC 220/7 of 39 overs. The Dare-Wyatt-Streeter method was used to calculate that the declaration was timed to perfection giving the Temple Grafters 3 overs fewer to chase down our total.

After a marvellous tea FASCC took the field and, although Predicta still thought he was captain, normal service was resumed and most decisions seemingly being made elsewhere, including Houders opening the bowling and taking the mantle of purveyor of "bad spin" for the day with figures on 0/36 off 6. His opening partner was Beaker who took 2/46 off 9 in his first spell. In the field the Dare calling excitement continued, with Cliff announcing "Yours!" for any ball that went anywhere near him and Bear shouting out the name of whichever player was on duty. It was at some stage in these opening overs that the Temple Grafton's Aussie nearly caused a riot. This outrage was heard nearly as far away in the borage field, where The Bear had deposited a humungous six previously, when said Aussie, having been strangled down the leg side, then walked!!! Predicta now somehow managed to persuade the skipper to let him bowl and ended up with 2/44 off 7. Solid contributions from the Temple Grafton middle order meant that a close finish was in the offing until mother nature took a hand and the rain fell, stumps were drawn and both teams returned to the pavilion. Seemingly Temple Grafton had fallen short of the total being 183/4 with 6 overs remaining and the away team were entertained by The Bear's novel bottle opening technique.

Beers were drunk, many started to get changed - indeed Deaker managed to be completely changed - when the oppo's skipper popped his head round the door, stumps in hand and uttered the immortal words "It's stopped raining". This was possibly the last time this phrase was used during the Kazaam. Deft sleight of hand meant that Cliff had the ball prised from his hand having turned in a spell of 1/17 off 5 and FASCC's hopes of containing Temple Grafton from getting the 38 the required off the final 6 overs lay with Predicta and Beaker. No one had properly explained the script to these two and, instead of trying the keep the run rate down, they uncharacteristically took wickets at regular intervals. As Beaker started the last over of the match Temple Grafton were now nine wickets down. He bowled an imperious maiden and finished with his best FAS analysis of 12 overs, 3 maidens, 5/50 (his last spell having been 3 overs, 2 maidens, 3/4). This was a good high to finish the game on with personal bests from the next generation in The Bear and Beaker. We weren't to know it at the time but it was also a good high to finish the formal cricketing action of the Cotswolds leg of the 2024 Kazaam - roll on the 2025 Supermajority via the KK (Kent Kazaam).

Report by Daniel Mortlock:

After missing out on a Fladbury game last year for the first time ever, due to the all too common news that the club had been struggling to get out sides, there was every chance that this traditional fixture might have gone the same way as so many others have over the last few years. It was thus fabulous that a tentative e-mail to their organiser was met positively, and so a convoy of Reynolds, Dares and, er, "Remnants" headed west in the hope of getting some cricket in before the forecast rain.

Having won the toss, we batted first on what looked like a good batting track, but the reality was rather different, both because of the wicket's two-paced nature and some excellent bowling. We'd been told that Fladbury's best cricketer had to leave at tea, and so presumed he was their opening bowler, David Harris, who gave nothing away in a spell of 7 overs, 2 maidens, 1/15. Still, while we'd struggled to score off Harris, surviving opener Joss Dare (21 off 51 balls) and Nigel Reynolds (26 off 35 balls) had started to score with more freedom; and 44/1 after 14 of our allotted 35 overs felt like a hard-earned foundation on which to build.

Unfortunately, it turned out it was Harris's replacement who was Fladbury's star man, introduced to us via this 'Who's On First?' inspired dialogue:

FAS scorer (shouted): "Bowler's name?"

Fladbury captain (struggling to be heard over the wind): "Scorer."

FAS scorer (again loudly): "Bowler's name?"

Fladbury captain (now clearer): "Scorer!"

FAS scorer (louder and somewhat irritably): "YES, I KNOW; WHAT'S THE NEW BOWLER'S NAME???"

Fladbury captain (louder and now also irritably): "THE BOWLER'S NAME IS SCORER."

FAS scorer (loud, but on the verge of giving up and just putting "bowler 4"): "THE BOWLER'S NAME IS WHAT?"

Fladbury captain (slowly, in the manner of explaining addition to a four-year-old - and probably regretting agreeing to the fixture): "NO, NOT 'WHAT'; THE NAME OF THE BOWLER IS ACTUALLY 'SCORER'."

This light relief was short-lived as Scorer (also a David) began the work of demolishing said foundation, finishing with deserved figures of 7 overs, 1 maiden, 5/12, and leaving us in deep trouble at 91/7 after 28 overs. Critically, though, that gave us 7 overs with both Harris and Scorer out of the picture, a fact exploited superbly by our lower order as we got quick runs from Jamie Dare (14 off 16 balls), Daniel Mortlock (23* off 23 balls), Joe White (25 off 17 balls, run out for the cause), Alex Clayton (16 off 9 balls, more than he managed off 41 balls yesterday) and Faruk "100 strike-rate" Kara (1* off 1 ball). We thus ended up more than doubling our 26-over score, and our final total of 149/9 was, while less than CB's official par score of 160, at least something to defend.

Fuelled - or perhaps weighed down - by the legendary local pork pies, we headed out into the field with a laser-like focus on the task of preventing Fladbury's top order from getting ahead of the game. Happily, Jamie Dare and Joe White combined for one of the best new-ball bowling partnerships in FAS history: Joe did Joe superbly, repeatedly hitting the perfect length and proving almost impossible to hit on his way to economical, if unlucky, figures of 7 overs, 1 maiden, 0/12; and Jamie was actually impossible to hit, albeit by landing on the sort of length needed for unversity cricket - when he, with some reluctance, went full and straight it was poles everywhere. The eventual result was a sort of perfection: 5 overs, 5 maidens, 2/0; it was the most economical spell in FAS history. However, as dominant as we'd been to restrict Fladbury to just 10/2 after 10 overs, it was still an even-money game: scoring the required 140 runs from 25 overs was manifestly possible, especially with and our two best bowlers no longer a big consideration and Fladbury stalwart David Prudden (12,000+ club runs and counting) still at the crease.

Fortunately, that was soon no longer the case as Alex Clayton (2/20) had Prudden well caught by wicket-keeper Chris Barras, standing up. And with Faruk Kara (1/15) also grabbing a wicket, it felt like Fladbury were done on just 60/5 after 23 overs . . . but that would be to ignore two vital facts: first, our 23-over total of 68/5 had been only marginally better; and, second, that it was at this point that it rained and rained hard, ending not just this game but our entire tour.

The one bright spot - metaphorical, not literal, as the automatic pavilion lights had turned on by this point - was that we had time to head to The Chequers Inn for a post-match drink with the oppo. The overall sense was of a ressurrection, not only in terms of the cricket club, which is now doing well for players, but of the town - the pub was so busy it took about ten minutes before someone realised it wasn't a Saturday night. So hopefully we'll be back at Fladbury - and the pub - in a year's time.