Bedok Kings Cricket: Week 3 bulletin

I ended the last week’s report saying “all’s well that ends well” but I sincerely hope the reverse of it which would be “all’s crap that starts crap” ISN’T true; given, the start to the league that BK2 has got off to.

Andy the Pacman.. was back from a hectic trip to Doha and some parts of UK, India & Pakistan..which covered few rounds of seminars on Spot fixing, the art, science and commercials behind it, one session was even titled  “Even a rookie can be a bookie”. One could almost sense that Andy was visibly disgusted at the bans handed out to Salman Butt and others..and no sooner did he enter the Cage I (under my disguise) overheard the conversation he had with one of the umpires

Umpire: “ So sir..you agree with the bans handed out to Butt?”

Pacman( exploded): “Motherf******, C****, Fu**** A*******……”

Umpire :“Sir sorry..we don’t speak Australian..although I am learning as we go along..but I believe its quite a difficult language..last time one of our national cricketers (from india) tried to  speak  that language he was in dire trouble sir…he still hasn’t been able to get the monkey completely off his back after that..oops I meant ‘maaki’…no nothing..you can ask tendulkar; I didn’t say anything”

Pacman (promptly showing off his hindi skills): “Relax young fella..I meant maderXXXXX, behenXXXXX..those guys at ICC are”

Umpire: “Say no more..I understand your feelings sir …your mentor has been slapped with a huge punishment..all for a couple of no balls..which Mitch Johnson bowls pro bono anyways…”

Pacman: “No no no…not that ..i actually had a bet running on it with Salman Butt himself....my money was on for it to be a life ban..damn I just lost 10 million Pak Rupees*…you know this whole ban itself was fixed I believe..Butt has a made a fortune out of it too..sigh!”

* Loosely converted that’s about  S$56.78 on current exchange rates

Game1: Organised Kaos vs BK 1

We were back for a game against the legendary Organised Kaos  and this time Shehzad did play for them indeed, bringing along with him the campaign to make it “organiser’s chaos” but for BK’s strong resistance in letting him get away with that. No one can lose the game for us..a right we would never concede. Once again wham bam Balaji who would have ideally been the difference between the two sides was kept out of the equation but BK failed to rein in other Kaos players from marching..familiar story, huh? Yes yes..not too different from the last two weeks ..so I am going to keep the excruciating account of this week rather short and crisp. Yet again we almost made it and gave it away. Off the field, we tried playing a masterstroke usually favored by Ponting..i.e whinged and haggled with the officials to try and dock Kaos, some runs for jersey mismatch and shoes etc..but even that wouldn’t help change the net result…if any sliver lining it’s only the first game that BK1 has lost so far..and we’ll aim to keep it the last defeat – can?

Game 2: Marina vs BK 2

Marina or also known as  “Chuckers paradise” are one team that deserves to win the league if seriousness with which games are played was the only aspect that mattered. They would play a bunch of primary school kids with the same intensive intent as they would against a first class level team. Rightly or wrongly they don’t let inability of their bowlers to bowl legally come in their way of participation..and their skipper idolizes Inzamam-ul-Haq as the bowler of a class. 15 degrees bent arm or not..but frustratingly they too remained too hot for us on the day where nothing seemed to go the King’s way. The plot was lost, as soon as Marina batted the first four overs without losing a wicket..but not without offering a million chances that we failed to convert..giving them a royal treatment only Kings' can afford to. In hindsight even if we had converted 2 out of the umpteen chances in the first four overs, end result would have been vastly different..but hindsight vision like they say is always 20-20. Individually BK2 performed decently, just that 99 runs conceded was a dozen too many as it proved in the end. Losing 7 wickets is never a good idea when you are chasing.  

Next we are up against Octopus once again..this time BK1 is taking them on. Can we avenge the first game this time round?

Can or cannot, that is the question!

-          Shakespeare Tan

Organised Kaos vs Bedok Kings 1
Bowlers	Wickets	Runs
Adam Jorgensen	2	7
Alex Mavian	0	30
Andrew ER	1	12
Julian Tate	1	25
Lalith Silva	2	4
Simon Yock	2	14
Batsman	Runs
Alex Mavian	4
Andrew ER	12
Lalith Silva	6
Julain Tate	4
Simon York	14
Adam Jorgenson	23
Marina vs Bedok Kings 2
Bowlers	Wickets	Runs
Aaron	4	1
Aslam	0	30
Mani	1	16
Pashant	2	13
Simon Lang	1	23
Tom Woods	1	16
Batsman	Runs
Tom Woods	16
Pashant Kotian	1
Aslum Maulvi	15
Mani Padmanabhan	13
Simon Lang	5
Aaron Marschke	8

Bedok Kings Cricket: Week 2 bulletin

Week 2 was a new week..octopus finally got beaten down..and all it took was a Bloomberg team to bring the marauding pussies down. Truly astonishing given this was the first time that Bloomberg team even turned up all at the same time for the same game. Breaking news as they say in their stock market parlance. In fact, some of the Bloomberg players were even seen exchanging business cards prior to the game..as they realised looking at each other's jerseys that they worked for the same company. Two players were even overheard talking to each other in thick Indian accent..saying they turned up because they were finally fed up seeing emails from this Bloomberg employee called Alexis and were just curious to know why this bugger was spamming them week after week about some cricket thing in kallang.Well done Bloomberg! Anyways thats besides the point..this space is meant for insider updates on games from the Bedok kings camp.

Game1: BK2 vs Organised Kaos

SO for the kings it continued to be the same Shit in a different week..we were up against a team who generally leave no stone unturned to stay true to their name..in fact every time shehzad plays for he tries to make sure the name means more like “organiser chaos”..but that wasn’t meant to be..they were more organised than kaos. But BK2 batting first got off to a decent start courtesy sensible batting from Gordon and Julian..Simon Lang and Aslam continued the effort leaving enough room for smokey and people’s champ thirgood to finish it off on a high. Against a quality bowling side 111 did seem a decent score if not brilliant and totally defendable. But the nelson figures casted a jinx as it would seem..and Organised Kaos in their reply started thumping away. Not a wicket given away by the first pair and second pair continued the thumping despite a couple of stumbling wickets to take their reply to 88 by the end of 8 overs. Wham bam..Balaji a.k.a best batsmen in the indoor league was to enter in along with his partner to finish the chase off. Interestingly bowling and fielding picked a couple of notches for the BK..and two wickets to curtail Balaji’s free flowing batting meant we had tamed the monster..bringing us to the last over with 4 runs required off it. Given what had happened in the previous game against octopus we all knew there was a good chance to peg them back and win away this humdinger..but for Kings the lady luck was frigid once again and a good opportunity to score a brilliant win was squandered away (wait till the week 3 report is out to continue on that)..for now that's that!

Game2: BK1 vs Comwerks

After some really hard fought games against good sides this draw against Comwerks almost seemed like a welcome shot of redbull that we all needed so badly. Admittedly, we were up against a side that barely managed to stitch together a team with 6 bodies regardless of cricket skills...but still a victory is a victory, more so when we are making conscious efforts to stay away from it. We almost succeeded in continuing the awful form by conceding 60 to Comwerks (approx. 10 times more than their previous best score in the league)...with chief and pacman showing the gentleman side of cricket a.k.a ass watching comwerks girl “Serena” ..and when she was on the crease all of sudden we had one volunteer too many for wicket keeping spot. Pacman won the race and made most of the close view that the position afforded...while chief wasn’t to stay out of the game either, cometh the chicks cometh the chief..bring it on “Delightfully Tacky, Yet Unrefined”. To sum it up at the end of the chase.. BK1 got 169 in the end..a score that would have very well won us the game against Kaos for sure..tad too late in the day but as they say “all’s well that ends well”. 

Organised Kaos vs Bedok Kings 2
Bowlers	Wickets	Runs
Aslam	1	10
Gordon	0	27
Julian	1	24
Mani	2	11
Simon Lang	0	25
Steve Thirgood	0	26
Batsman	Runs
Gordon	19
Julian	7
Simon Lang	15
Aslam	12
Steve Thirgood	12
Mani	24
Comwerks vs Bedok Kings 2
Bowlers	Wickets	Runs
Bowlers	Wickets	Runs
Alex Mavian	1	9
Andy Er	2	10
Mani	0	14
Prasant Kotian	1	22
Sean Hankin	2	-1
Tom Woods	2	6
Batsman	Runs
Alex Mavian	32
Andy Er	20
Tom Woods	18
Prasant Kotian	6
Sean Hankin	30
Mani	21

 Week 3 stats and bulletin to follow soon..keep looking out!

Bedok Kings Cricket: Week 1 bulletin

Just the first week and already some dramatic matches for BK.. two contrasting matches and results. Here’s a synopsis from a source whose secrecy is only exceeded by the secrecy behind Andrew Symonds vs Harbhajan Singh!

Game 1: BK1  vs 1 hand 1 bounce who were a bunch of newbies (to indoor cricket that is) was anything but a cakewalk..but for the clinical performance by BK1. When BK opted to field first and began bowling first it looked like we were in for thumping victory aided by clueless  running and plan-less batting ..but it just took a couple of overs of sighting and 1 hand 1 bounce proved they were quick enough to learn the art..and once they sorted out some of the nuances they looked threatening enough to post a biggie on the scoreboard. Just when the signs were ominous BK pulled the rate back and held them to ~ 90..which I still think was commendable of the other team after the way they were looking suicidal in the initial overs. But what emerged in BK’s innings to chase it down was the well planned out batting strategy. Gordo showed exactly how risk free indoor batting is done and by the time the three batting pairs were done the opposition score was mauled over by a good 20+ runs margin as we ended up with 116 courtesy of BK batters drilling the opponent bowlers almost effortlessly and giving the first timers a good indoor batting 101 session. On the job is where you learn the best. Well done BK1 and must mention 1 hand 1 bounce is a good solid team to watch out for as the season progresses..especially strong on bowling as they seem. As for BK..the way they played reminds one of the pre match quote from once legendary (son of a bitch) cricketer turned ace match fixer Mohd. Azharuddin who when once asked during his tenure as Indian skipper, “what his strategy for the match was?” had replied “bat well, bowl well and field well”; he sure had his way with words and that strategy just couldn’t go wrong if executed which is what BK1 did with panache!

Game 2: BK2 vs Octopus was a classic  “champ” vs “under dogs” to start with. Clearly we were up against a team which  has been super consistent over past few seasons..winning the last 2 seasons almost without breaking a sweat..and haven’t dropped more than a game or two of the last 20 odd matches they have played. So the task was cut out for BK2..but not a deterrent; if anything it was incentive enough to spur the team up knowing that if we beat them right at the start of the season..we virtually owned the season. On that note we were all set for a game which we already knew could be a solid contest if we played to our potential and indeed, what followed was a humdinger of a match..but at the same time heart breaking and gut wrenching for BK2 as we lost by a margin as narrow as it gets in the history of seasoned pro indoor cricket. After Skipper smokey-smoker won the toss and elected to field first, almost everything went right for the kings. Left armer Simon Yock struck in his first over  picking a couple of wickets, one of which was aided by a sparkling catch by smokey-smoker diving in front to hold on to a blinder. That dive forward of course experts reckon was aided by the protruding belly and its gravitational interaction with the ground.  Nevertheless, every player on the field had his tail up and raring to go after the batsmen with aggressive bowling and fielding. Though Octopus is one of the most consistent sides when it comes to batting they struggled against some disciplined bowling by BK2 supplemented by water tight fielding. While Simon Yock and Jorgo kept a tight lid on Octopus batsmen with tight stuff Simon Lang came on for the middle overs and highlighted octopus’ woes against left arm bowlers. Lalith mixed it up well to fox the batsmen, Jorgo was on like a mean bowling machine in his second over, Gordo continued his form from the first match and all of that meant the last 4 overs was death bowling at its best and BK2 had won themselves the first round by restricting Octopus to a meager 76. With about 25 runs per batting pair there was no need to panic or to go for the booming shots..and that’s exactly what happened in the first 8 overs of BK’s batting innings. 65 at the end of two batting pairs meant only 12 required of the last batting pair to seal of a comprehensive victory over the reigning champions. No dramas were to be expected, however that’s where for the first time BK2 was looking wanting..some mixed nerves and sharp bowling by octopus led to a couple of run outs that shouldn’t have been..and all of sudden the balance started to swing away from BK2 until they recovered and brought the game back to parity with 2 needed of the last ball..it was always going to be a nerve-wracking moment for any of the 8 players on the field; batsmen hoping bowler makes that one mistake, bowler hoping for batsman to lose his nerve..fielders praying the ball doesn’t come their way..it was all happening and amidst the noise, last ball was delivered..faintest of the edges  and rub of the green went Octopus way. 

1 Hand 1 Bounce vs Bedok Kings 1
Bowlers	Wickets		Runs
Aaron	3		-5
Andrew ER	1		25
Gordon Falconer	3		-4
Lalith Silva	1		21
Micheal Ocego	2		7
Simon yock	1		16
Batsmen	Runs
Lalith Silva	13
Andrew ER	16
Gordon Falconer	19
Aaron Marshe	16
Simon yock	19
Micheal Ocego	12
Octopus vs Bedok Kings 2
Bowlers		Wickets		Runs
Adam  Jorgenson		2		12
Gordon Falconer		0		27
Lalith Silva		2		3
Mani		2		12
Simon Lang		1		14
Simon yock		2		6
Batsmen		Runs
Simon yock		13
Adam Yorgenson		16
Gordon Falconer		15
Simon Lang		17
Lalith Silva		6
Mani		-1