Div 2 Round 14: Aliens Vs Fossum
When: 21 AUG 2016
Where: Bærum
Aliens Cricket Club 151/10 (27.3 ov)
Fossum Cricket Club 207/9 (30.0 ov)
Fossum Cricket Club - Won by 56 runs
Niazi’s 11 sixes give Aliens nightmares on field of dreams
While Aliens have played cricket on driving ranges and harness racing tracks, a baseball field encircled by a roller-skiing track was a first. But the field of dreams soon turned to the stuff of nightmares, as an Afghan kid clocked up his 19th six against us in two innings.
It all started out so well. Aliens had Fossum 3/29 by the time Will Barton turned up after 10.3 overs. That was thanks to a miserly opening spell from Damon and Dennis. But from there it went quicker downhill than Aksel Lund Svindal. The culprit was young gun H. Niazi whose supple wrists went to work on the Aliens attack for the second time in as many weeks. We actually bowled quite well, sending down just six wides in thirty overs, which is possibly a club record. But every bad ball we did bowl was leisurely dispatched by Niazi over the boundary.And by a long way. Apparently he doesn’t like 4s; he only hit two of them.
Tens of minutes were spent wading through the largest crop of wheat in greater Oslo and your correspondent had to ask his and Will B’s family to move to safety when they sat within Niazi’s range.
While he was in, Fossum went from a hopeless 3/29 off 10.3 to a commanding 174/4 off 25.4. They then collapsed to end 9/207 off 30. In other words, in the 15 overs when Niazi wasn’t batting they scored 8/62. Unfortunately for us, the 15 overs he did bat, they scored 0/145. Surely someone could make a bloody good graph out of that. Kishore?
It should also be said that H Sohel supported him well with 54 off 55. The next best score was 17.
There’s not a lot to say about our batting. Fossum tried to make it close by gifting us 45 extras, including 39 wides. It was the top score, something that isn’t as rare as it should be for Aliens. Dennis was close behind on 37, and there was still hope when he lifted one of Fossum’s bowlers for two straight 4s in a row with Taufiq looking good at the other end. But we never really looked like getting there, and our lack of 6 hitting ability always makes it hard for us on grounds with heavy outfields, like the “field of dreams” in Rud.