A season to forget. By far our worst. We only won 4 games and 3 of those were in a 20-20 competition against very moderate opposition. In the normal format of 35 or 40 over games, we only had 1 victory. Teams we play have improved though, as I've said before. They are going to beat us more often than we beat them. Most of our defeats were by big margins as we were usually short of bowlers. Hassan missed the majority of games with injury and Abbas and Sami didn't play that many games either. Abbas wanted to bat higher - at least on occasions - but how do you keep everyone in a team happy? Especially this team.! We don't know if Abbas will play again, or Sami for that matter. Only two of our bowlers, Todorow and Sami, took over 10 wickets. Qasim, a new acquisition, looked a fairly decent bowler with good pace and bounce but he joined us quite late in the season. Ollie Amos, another newcomer, looked promising as a batsman but was not committed and it's highly unlikely we'll see him again. He probably had nothing better to do at the time! Bilal, who only played in one 20-20 game for us, was a very impressive bowler but he was upset when the opposition complained about his action. It looked OK to me.
In the batting, once again Mark Bradshaw was really solid and Riaz continues to improve. Prasanth scored a brilliant 87 in our last match but he too missed a lot of games through injury. Availability was a big problem for us last season, with injuries, people working, holidays and other reasons. The worst blow was, of course, Hassan's absence. Another problem was that some players were below their best.
Let's hope it's not the same story for Nomads next season. JC.
Tuesday, 8 December 2015
Tuesday, 1 December 2015
2015 report coming soon and statistical update
Next time I am passing a decent internet cafe I will post the report for the 2015 season written by Nomads' controversial and tough-talking wicket-keeper, John Crossland. It is quite a good read.
Also, various statistical landmarks have been passed in the last few seasons.
Emil Todorow has now made a scarcely believable 228 successive appearances for the club and has played in over 300 games in all.
John Crossland and Nick Lefebve have passed 250 appearances.
Mahesh Vyas and Riaz Khan have passed the 100 appearance mark.
After a recount of old fixtures, Sumith Prasanna played in 100 games.
I have included a fixture against Battersea Spinners at Vine Road in 2003 where Nomads brought 14 men and lent 3 to the opposition. This was a perfectly normal Sunday game on a decent pitch prepared by a high quality groundsman (well, alright.... prepared by Renato Philip.) For some reason, it was decided afterwards that this would count as a practice match; but, since we have included 10-over-a-side matches and a game where we combined with Kingston Taxes, then I think the Spinners game should be included (and not just because I scored 32 not out and took my only wicketkeeping catch for the Nomads.) Actually, the main beneficiaries are Sumith - who is now up to 100 appearances - and Chris Kennedy, whose 27 is now his top score for the club.
The 9 men who have 100 caps for the club are; Emil Todorow, John Crossland, Nick Lefebve, John Chance, Abdul Khan, Hassan Khan, Mahesh Vyas, Riaz Khan and Sumith Prasanna.
Chris Kennedy with 91 and Andrew West with 88 would make up the 11.
Other landmarks have been passed as well. I will add them to this post soon.
Also, various statistical landmarks have been passed in the last few seasons.
Emil Todorow has now made a scarcely believable 228 successive appearances for the club and has played in over 300 games in all.
John Crossland and Nick Lefebve have passed 250 appearances.
Mahesh Vyas and Riaz Khan have passed the 100 appearance mark.
After a recount of old fixtures, Sumith Prasanna played in 100 games.
I have included a fixture against Battersea Spinners at Vine Road in 2003 where Nomads brought 14 men and lent 3 to the opposition. This was a perfectly normal Sunday game on a decent pitch prepared by a high quality groundsman (well, alright.... prepared by Renato Philip.) For some reason, it was decided afterwards that this would count as a practice match; but, since we have included 10-over-a-side matches and a game where we combined with Kingston Taxes, then I think the Spinners game should be included (and not just because I scored 32 not out and took my only wicketkeeping catch for the Nomads.) Actually, the main beneficiaries are Sumith - who is now up to 100 appearances - and Chris Kennedy, whose 27 is now his top score for the club.
The 9 men who have 100 caps for the club are; Emil Todorow, John Crossland, Nick Lefebve, John Chance, Abdul Khan, Hassan Khan, Mahesh Vyas, Riaz Khan and Sumith Prasanna.
Chris Kennedy with 91 and Andrew West with 88 would make up the 11.
Other landmarks have been passed as well. I will add them to this post soon.
Sunday, 29 November 2015
Coming soon - Andrew West - A cricketing life
Regular readers of this blog - if there are any left - will be quite interested to hear that John Crossland has prepared an appraisal of the cricketing career of Nomads' controversial medium pacer. This will appear on these pages soon, and I will add my own Golden Moments of West (surprisingly, I could only think of about 14 of them, but I'm sure other Nomads' players will be able to think of some I have forgotten.)
It was sad recently when Brian Close passed away and they printed that bittersweet photo of a semi-naked Close smiling wrily and covered with bruises. It set me thinking about what a similar picture of Andrew would be like. Instead of the semi-smile there might be an angry snarl and he would be mouthing something like; "F***ing Bo***cks." Also, the bruises would not have been inflicted by lifters from Wes Hall, Charlie Griffith or Michael Holding, but by freak pre-match catching practice injuries from throws by Emil, Nick or Raj. The overall effect would be similar though - 2 charismatic cricketers who laughed in the face of pain and injury.
It was sad recently when Brian Close passed away and they printed that bittersweet photo of a semi-naked Close smiling wrily and covered with bruises. It set me thinking about what a similar picture of Andrew would be like. Instead of the semi-smile there might be an angry snarl and he would be mouthing something like; "F***ing Bo***cks." Also, the bruises would not have been inflicted by lifters from Wes Hall, Charlie Griffith or Michael Holding, but by freak pre-match catching practice injuries from throws by Emil, Nick or Raj. The overall effect would be similar though - 2 charismatic cricketers who laughed in the face of pain and injury.
Tuesday, 13 October 2015
Player of the year etc / John's report / Annual Meeting
We will probably have our Annual Meeting in early December at either Namak Mandi or Mirgh Masala, both in Tooting.
Batsman of the Year must be Mark - well ahead on both runs scored and average. Honourable mention to Riaz though, and Prasanth played the best individual innings with 87 against the Exiles. Hassan also had a good average.
Bowler of the Year is pretty interesting. Abbas had the best average and took a decent amount of wickets but quit the club in May. Sami was good as was Riaz, though Riaz didn't bowl that many overs. Hassan impressed but missed a large chunk of the season. Emil's average was not fantastic but was respectable in the context of our performances. He got through a hell of a lot of work, was the top wicket-taker and it was his best year as a bowler for a while.
Fielder of the Year could have a number of contenders. I'd have to go back through the reports before I stuck my neck out.
Main Player of the Year contenders would be, I would say, Mark and Riaz.
Sorry, I haven't posted John's report of the season here, for the valid reason that he hasn't written it yet - partly because he keeps going to Dartmoor on holiday and also because I still have the scorebook. It promises to be interesting though and, when he does write it, I will post it on here along with all the other seasonal reports he has done, if I can get my hands on them.
Batsman of the Year must be Mark - well ahead on both runs scored and average. Honourable mention to Riaz though, and Prasanth played the best individual innings with 87 against the Exiles. Hassan also had a good average.
Bowler of the Year is pretty interesting. Abbas had the best average and took a decent amount of wickets but quit the club in May. Sami was good as was Riaz, though Riaz didn't bowl that many overs. Hassan impressed but missed a large chunk of the season. Emil's average was not fantastic but was respectable in the context of our performances. He got through a hell of a lot of work, was the top wicket-taker and it was his best year as a bowler for a while.
Fielder of the Year could have a number of contenders. I'd have to go back through the reports before I stuck my neck out.
Main Player of the Year contenders would be, I would say, Mark and Riaz.
Sorry, I haven't posted John's report of the season here, for the valid reason that he hasn't written it yet - partly because he keeps going to Dartmoor on holiday and also because I still have the scorebook. It promises to be interesting though and, when he does write it, I will post it on here along with all the other seasonal reports he has done, if I can get my hands on them.
Clapham Nomads Averages 2015
Nomads averages 2015.
Batting; (Qualification - 3 innings on 3 separate days.)
Mark Bradshaw - 394 runs @ 39.40
Riaz Khan - 240 runs @ 34.29
Hassan Khan - 161 runs @ 32.20
Prasanth Pattiyil - 165 runs @ 23.57
Gul - 230 runs @ 19.17
Abdul Khan - 148 runs @ 14.80
Darwin Gunawardena - 101 runs @ 12.63
Imran - 46 runs @ 11.50
Mahesh Vyas - 99 runs @ 8.25
Nick Lefebve - 45 runs @ 7.50
Emil Todorow - 37 runs @ 7.40
Sami - 24 runs @ 6.00
Hamid - 16 runs @ 5.33
Abbas Khan - 8 runs @ 4.00
John Crossland - 4 runs @ 4.00
Qasim - 9 runs @ 3.00
Bowling; (Qualification - 4 wickets)
Abbas Khan - 9 wickets @ 13.44
Ollie Amos - 5 wickets @ 17.80
Riaz Khan - 9 wickets @ 18.67
Hassan Khan - 7 wickets @ 21.43
Sami - 11 wickets @ 23.91
Imran - 4 wickets @ 24.50
Qasim - 4 wickets @ 24.50
Emil Todorow - 14 wickets @ 28.93
Gul - 5 wickets @ 31.20
Abdul Khan - 8 wickets @ 48.25
Fielding; (Qualification - 3 catches)
5 - Abdul Khan
4 - John Crossland (all as wicketkeeper), Riaz Khan
3 - Hassan Khan, Mark Bradshaw, Mahesh Vyas, Ollie Amos.
There were no stumpings.
Batting; (Qualification - 3 innings on 3 separate days.)
Mark Bradshaw - 394 runs @ 39.40
Riaz Khan - 240 runs @ 34.29
Hassan Khan - 161 runs @ 32.20
Prasanth Pattiyil - 165 runs @ 23.57
Gul - 230 runs @ 19.17
Abdul Khan - 148 runs @ 14.80
Darwin Gunawardena - 101 runs @ 12.63
Imran - 46 runs @ 11.50
Mahesh Vyas - 99 runs @ 8.25
Nick Lefebve - 45 runs @ 7.50
Emil Todorow - 37 runs @ 7.40
Sami - 24 runs @ 6.00
Hamid - 16 runs @ 5.33
Abbas Khan - 8 runs @ 4.00
John Crossland - 4 runs @ 4.00
Qasim - 9 runs @ 3.00
Bowling; (Qualification - 4 wickets)
Abbas Khan - 9 wickets @ 13.44
Ollie Amos - 5 wickets @ 17.80
Riaz Khan - 9 wickets @ 18.67
Hassan Khan - 7 wickets @ 21.43
Sami - 11 wickets @ 23.91
Imran - 4 wickets @ 24.50
Qasim - 4 wickets @ 24.50
Emil Todorow - 14 wickets @ 28.93
Gul - 5 wickets @ 31.20
Abdul Khan - 8 wickets @ 48.25
Fielding; (Qualification - 3 catches)
5 - Abdul Khan
4 - John Crossland (all as wicketkeeper), Riaz Khan
3 - Hassan Khan, Mark Bradshaw, Mahesh Vyas, Ollie Amos.
There were no stumpings.
Energy Exiles etc.
Belated congratulations to Chris Plume and his all-conquering Energy Exiles side on recording their highest-ever number of victories - 15 - in a season. I think Nomads' best is about twelve. 2015 was not Nomads' best season but at least we played our part in the Exiles achieving this feat. Having looked through their list of wins, I would say that they had 4 victories more convincing than their triumph over Nomads in August, whereas our game in September was probably their 6th-most difficult win. A bit of a sad stat, I know, but it shows that they are crushing some other teams even more resoundingly than us.
They have re-built incredibly well from a point a couple of years ago when things seemed fairly even between the sides, and a period of several years before that when Exiles had an edge but would tend to grind out incredibly gruelling and tense wins over us; usually in the final over.
Getting back to our match in September, I mentioned that there was incident and anecdote but there was nothing major really. We had a very polite discussion in the pub about an LBW appeal that one of our umpires had turned down (You're shocked, I can tell) but apart from that the only strange moment came at the end of our innings when 2 wickets fell on the 4th and 5th balls of the final over, leaving No. 11 John Crossland to drop his scorebook hurriedly and scramble for his pads. Some of the Exiles fielders and - oddly - one of our umpires felt that it wasn't worth John coming in or that he should be timed out (In fact I think John did just about make it to the middle within the required time - 2 or 3 minutes or whatever....who's counting in Sunday cricket?) One Exile who certainly wasn't joining in the calls for John not to come out was Andy Wingfield - he was on a hat-trick.
I knew John would charge down the pitch and notch a "potentially crucial" run or leg bye and that is what happened. In John's own words; "I came down the pitch and squirted it to leg.....and the ball as well."
As I am feeling masochistic, here is the overall record between Nomads and Exiles. (Cheekily, I am including the Exiles' 1 wicket win v Open University in July 1998, not just because I took 5 wickets believe it or not, but also because it was virtually a Nomads line-up with few or no Hunters - though bizarrely a Nomads regular was wearing Dave's trousers.)
Played 26
Nomads wins 8
Draws 2
Exiles wins 16
They have re-built incredibly well from a point a couple of years ago when things seemed fairly even between the sides, and a period of several years before that when Exiles had an edge but would tend to grind out incredibly gruelling and tense wins over us; usually in the final over.
Getting back to our match in September, I mentioned that there was incident and anecdote but there was nothing major really. We had a very polite discussion in the pub about an LBW appeal that one of our umpires had turned down (You're shocked, I can tell) but apart from that the only strange moment came at the end of our innings when 2 wickets fell on the 4th and 5th balls of the final over, leaving No. 11 John Crossland to drop his scorebook hurriedly and scramble for his pads. Some of the Exiles fielders and - oddly - one of our umpires felt that it wasn't worth John coming in or that he should be timed out (In fact I think John did just about make it to the middle within the required time - 2 or 3 minutes or whatever....who's counting in Sunday cricket?) One Exile who certainly wasn't joining in the calls for John not to come out was Andy Wingfield - he was on a hat-trick.
I knew John would charge down the pitch and notch a "potentially crucial" run or leg bye and that is what happened. In John's own words; "I came down the pitch and squirted it to leg.....and the ball as well."
As I am feeling masochistic, here is the overall record between Nomads and Exiles. (Cheekily, I am including the Exiles' 1 wicket win v Open University in July 1998, not just because I took 5 wickets believe it or not, but also because it was virtually a Nomads line-up with few or no Hunters - though bizarrely a Nomads regular was wearing Dave's trousers.)
Played 26
Nomads wins 8
Draws 2
Exiles wins 16
Wednesday, 16 September 2015
Still to come on this blog
Please don't give up reading this blog just because the season is over. Still to come is more detail on some of the matches played, especially the Exiles v Nomads match last Sunday (13/9), the averages and nominations for Player of the Year, details of the Annual Meeting (hopefully at the Namak Mandi in December), John Crossland's report on the 2015 season - it might not be for the faint-hearted; and various other bits of self-indulgent waffle. I bet you can't wait.
But anyway, thanks to everyone that has turned out for the Nomads (or read this blog) this season.
Nick
But anyway, thanks to everyone that has turned out for the Nomads (or read this blog) this season.
Nick
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