Match Report vs Medics 10th August 2026 @ Bryn-y-Don (Skipper Jim, report Iwan)

On a very hot evening at HQ, the early competition was to see whose players could be more tardy. A game won by the Medics mostly due to about half of their team going to the wrong ground (plus one of their players said he was late because of an emergency, which seemed a legitimate excuse).

Jim, skipper for the evening, won the toss and chose to bat – mainly to not field in the worst of the heat, and maybe with an eye on the light at the back end of the 18-over-a-side game. Some of the Casuals’ spent much of the pre-game period trying to erect some form of shade with the smallest umbrella. After a few attempts, it was still a bit prone to collapsing – perhaps an omen…

Eventually, the game started just after 6:15 with Jim and Rhys opening up. They got the team off to a good start, supported by a high number of extras – mainly wides – which made up 11 of the 23-run partnership. Jim was the first to go in the 4th over, adjudged LBW, having scored 5 and brought Will into the action. Rhys had looked in decent touch and carved a few boundaries away before nicking through to the keeper for 16 off one of the few non-wide balls in the 5th over.

The Casuals’ own GP went in to face the Medics. By this point the Medics had started to find a bit of accuracy, led by bowler Chai, leading to Will losing his wicket having been bowled for 7. Joe (the physio) joined GP in the middle – and it wasn’t long before Greg got into his work with regular boundaries. However, it wasn’t long before Joe fell for 3, caught and bowled by Chai. Iwan (no medical experience) joined Greg. The main plan was to stop haemorrhaging wickets, get a bit of a partnership going and try to apply more pressure on the Medics. At the halfway point the Casuals’ were 69 for 4.

The partnership was more of a dictatorship with Greg taking the attack to the bowlers and Iwan taking more of a support role (as well as hitting a rare, but very pleasing cover drive). Iwan eventually fell LBW for 6 in the 13th over with the score up to 112-5.

By the end of over 16, the score was 127-9 with Nadders, Pat, Shakey and DT all falling for ducks to Rahul. In that time Greg had scored his half-century, retired and returned to the middle alongside the ‘one-armed bandit’ Dan who had luckily shown up to make up the 11 earlier in the evening. Greg and Dan batted positively to push the final total to a respectable 152-9, scoring 65 and 11 respectively.

Jim – 5, LBW Chai
Rhys – 16, Bowled Nish, Caught WK
Will – 7, Bowled Chai
Greg P – 65, Not Out
Joe – 3, Caught and Bowled Chai
Iwan – 6, LBW Irfan
Nadeem – 0, Bowled Rahul
Pat – 0, Bowled Rahul, Caught ?
Shakey – 0, Bowled Rahul
Dave – 0, Bowled Rahul
Dan – 11, Not Out

Extras – 39
Total – 152-9. 18 overs.

M Diamood – 3-0-35-0
Shanawk – 1-0-6-0
Chai – 4-0-27-3
Nish – 3-0-25-1
Rahul – 4-0-20-4
Irfan – 2-0-18-1
Joe – 1-0-13-0

Ironically the Medics seemed to have a waiting list for sorting their field, and despite bowling 9 overs consecutively from each end, their innings took so long we took to the field immediately – then waited for their openers and umpires to appear (and scorers for what it was worth). Their was some uncertainty of how defendable the total would be, or how strong the Medics batting line up was.

At this point, the author of this humble report would like to advise that the scorers for the Medics seemed to have never done so before (leading to some corrections having to be made at the pub after) and it was becoming incredibly dark, so like the ball, the action was not so easy to follow closely.

What can be said is that the all of the bowlers put in a good effort, and were backed up well in the field (despite visibility issues), managing to largely slow the efforts of the batsmen to grind out a well-deserved 5-run win. Shakey (2), Greg (1), Pat (1) taking the 5 wickets that fell.

The Medics openers scored 51 (Chai) who retired, and 42 (John) who was well stumped by Jim off Shakey’s bowling. After that partnership, the Medics struggled to put much else together and without the support of a much-reduced extras input (18) from the Casuals.

After the excellent innings and a half from Greg, the biggest stand out moments of the game were courtesy of some excellent fielding from Joe and Will, albeit in unorthodox fashion. Early in the game, Joe managed to somehow stick his foot out and prevent the ball from rocketing to the boundary, saving 3 runs. Will also managed to pull off a similarly impressive feat on the boundary with his own fancy footwork, saving 2 further runs. Both shots were certain boundaries if not for the impressive footwork of those two!

Iwan – 4-0-26-0
Dave – 2-0-25-0
Shakey – 4-0-39-2
Nadeem – 2-0-17-0
Greg – 4-0-24-1
Patrick – 2-0-12-2

Extras – 18

Chai – 51, Not Out
John – 42 Bowled Shakey, Stumped Jim
Shanawk – 3 Bowled Shakey
Rikki – 1, Bowled Greg
Niv – 8, Not Out
Martin – 16, Bolwed Pat
Manjiv – 0, Bolwed Pat
Nish – 7, Not Out

Total 148(ish)-5. 18 Overs.

*Don’t do the maths on this, we won!*

A final mention should also go to the injured, but very willing, Dan who stepped in to help score some important runs and field well despite the ongoing injury.

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