When: 24 May

Where: Ekeberg 1

Fjord - 158/7 (25.4 ov)

Aliens - 154/10 (30.0 ov)

Fjord won by 6 wickets

See the scorecard at CricHQ

Ducks, Air fives and dance moves kick off Aliens season ‘20 against Fjord.

Alright then! After extreme Social distancing (read belly building), fake 5K times (you know who you are!) and a ton of Thursday night quizzes on Zoom (where we quite literally ran out of interesting questions), it was finally time to play some cricket. Aliens kicked off Season20 with a friendly against Fjord ( team A+B and a few others). Not a single Alien was keen to shake off their hard-earned pounds just yet and the pre-game warm-up was more a walk around the ground to remind ourselves how big the cricket ground is compared to the backyard tik-tok videos we have been consuming due to the absolute lack of any other form of cricket on TV. Everyone was reminded of the Corona-guidelines by the president while Dennis won the toss and chose to bowl first and graciously let them use 16+ players for the match.

Social distancing!

We were required to maintain social distancing at all times and both Shahabaz and Dennis took that very seriously, distancing the ball from the middle of the bat and edging the ball to gully and keeper respectively. Damon did even better by distancing the ball from the bat all together and was bowled soon after. All three great admirers of the shape of a ducks egg (ahem!), apparently. Dave joined Marcus in the middle, only to soon send Marcus back, retired hurt, when he clipped his thumb with his bat while attempting a run.

The first four! (-ish)

Bobby joined Dave in the middle to steady the innings. The ground was damp from the rain earlier that day and there was no value for any shots in front of the wicket. Bobby had an answer for that, of course!, skillfully playing his -now trademark- french cut behind the keeper for the first four of the season for Aliens! Is there a better way to get it?.. Nah. probably not. He perished soon after attempting a massive hoik over midwicket, caught inside the 30-yard circle. Sudesh joined Dave, but returned soon getting out in a rather unlucky fashion playing on a full toss.

Flattening the Curve

Reeling at 48-5 (effectively 6 with Marcus retired hurt) we desperately needed to flatten the curve. Harry joined Dave in the middle and did just that. Some cautious batting and a generous helping of wides due to the left-right combination got us across 100 a little over the 20 over mark. Dave played around a straight one and got bowled in an attempt to increase the run-rate. 122-6 read the scorecard in 25 overs

The Second wave

Big Dave was promoted up the order to help the run rate. Fjord has upped their game and bought on their strike bowler by now. Boundaries were hard to come by, but we ran extremely well between the wickets (*last over not included in this stat) to make up for that. Harry hit a few fours while the opposite team kept admiring Dave ́s height (amplified by the ridiculously short bat he was wielding). Benan joined Harry in the middle soon with the only intention of bagging the most stylish batsman award this season with his helmet over a cap worn backwards and fluorescent shades. Comedy of errors led to three runouts in the final over and Aliens were all out setting 155 for Fjord to chase in 30 overs, helped graciously by 41 extras.

Wide-wide-Bang!

After an anti-bac bath, Aliens took the field to defend 155. If you thought we were rusty with the Bat, you were in for a treat when we had the ball in hand. Damon and Big Dave shared the new ball, the latter starting off his spell with a few wides. Aliens were jolted awake by an instinctive hook for six by their opener to a pretty decent bumper from Dave. To be fair, it isn't perfect conditions to bowl when you have a steady drizzle and have a bowling crease marked by 6 inch wide slippery paint-like thingie. Damon got rid of their impatient opener soon after, caught at midwicket by Harry. Balle balle and the bouncer Benan and Peter took over the bowling and kept the batsmen under control for a while. Both eager to show the world what each was practising while we had the time off. Peter did that in his first over bowling a bouncer which was called a wide (!!), which left a massive grin on his face. A few wayward balls later he was rewarded with the wicket of the other opener, caught by Damon at Square leg. Benan had to wait a bit longer to show off his celebratory dance moves, eventually bringing it out prematurely when the batsman edged behind and stood his ground. Umpire raised his finger soon enough for him to merrily resume his Balle Balle. Catch(es) of the season Dave was introduced to the attack to slow things down and did just that. Even with the keeper standing the mandated 1 metre behind the batsman, he kept the batsmen in check and the scoreboard pressure started to show. Bobby took a good catch and was quick to claim that it would be the catch of the season. Only to be outdone by the diving Big Dave in Dave ́s the next over. Bobby was quick to concede that his would be the ́second-best ́, and even quicker to change that to ́third-best ́ the very next ball. Thanks to the great grab by Shahabaz behind the stumps. Fjord struggled to 78-6 and Dave picked up three wickets before drinks..

Post-drink rush

Fjord resumed the innings with purpose. Their veteran captain led the way with some lusty blows to bring the asking rate way down run-a-ball. Dennis bought himself on and later bought on Harry and even Sudesh to get something to give, but fjord raced home comfortably, fittingly ending the innings with a four. With no handshakes allowed, we had to do Air-fives and Elbow taps after the game and were on our way bloody happy to have played a game after so long. Could ́ve been better with a win, but hey, we get another chance in three days!

Corona guidelines in-charge

Big shout out to Arif who was at the ground as the Corona in-charge to oversee that we followed Corona guidelines set by NCF. Rules also required the person not to take part in the match. As exciting as it is to see us walk around and play ́top class ́ cricket, this definitely is a sort of commitment that makes any Alien proud. It's been a difficult few months, but we are glad that we get to play cricket again and should follow the rules set by the authorities, and most importantly,

Wash those damn hands!