No such thing as a free lunch for students as Philanderers break 300 for first time
With the Fuhrer’s edict that match reports must be submitted within 72 hours on pain of death this year… I’ll keep this brief.
At the 508th attempt a Philanderers side posted a score of over 300 in racking up a monster score of 319-4 on Sunday 2nd May in the 40 over per side encounter v Cambridge University Crusaders at Fitzwilliam College. Though there were contributions from TPT (40), Gill (24) and Pearson (28no) the record feat was built on a superb 101 from Hammond and an almost equally impressive 92 from Chandraker.
This passed the previous record of 295-7 against Holkham in 2013 (Hammond opening the batting scored 74 that day with long-time associate and small bear James Coe scoring 95). No offence to Holkham, who have been great friends of the club for many years, but this weekend’s opposition were a somewhat more serious outfit in the form of the University 2nd XI - we had arrived to find them completing warm up drills in matching training shirts to motivational music from a speaker placed on the outfield. That we even have a fixture against this team would have been unimaginable a few years ago, let alone winning, forget about posting a record score...
… But enough self-congratulatory navel gazing (recently voted the club’s third most recognised skill, beyond ruining Sunday cricket for many friendly sides and selling and/or developing Cambridge property) with the first inning’s complete we retired for tea, Phil once again having arranged for covid secure packed lunches to be provided for his Sunday boys. Before we could get our hands on the lunches they were however devoured by the hungry students, a small breakdown in communication failing to inform them that there was no lunch provided for them. Fortunately, step forward Ed Dodson to save the day for the second time in 24 hours (he stepped into the team late on Saturday night after two withdrawals) to rush off to Sainsbury’s to purchase a round of sandwiches and a few apples.
With such a massive score on the board the Crusaders needed to start well, but an early wicket each for Davidson (3-48 from 8) and Campbell (1-31 from 4) prevented any chance of that. As ever at Fitz though it was Rutt who was the pick of the bowlers, taking three top order wickets in figures of 4-36 from 5.3 overs as CUCC fell to 256 all out in 36.3 overs. Champagne moment to Dodson for snaring their top scorer for 71 in a sprightly two over spell.
So, the season is underway in style, ‘the Sunday boys’ go 46 matches unbeaten on UK soil and the 300 barrier is broken… let’s see what else 2021 has in store…
George Dean
The record breakers