Anson Moments – The day we took on the Middlesex Tamils

Anson Moments

I am starting a new category of blogs called Anson moments. Most of the blogs so far have focused on legendary individuals in the club or some sort of general theme. I’ll continue to write such blogs. But a lot of our history and great memories are often of smaller or individual Anson moments or events. 

Great people and great events are what make great stories. So for a club like ours that is steeped in lore I think it’s about time that we get some of them written down. The moments can be great matches, great innings, nights out, weekends away. Anything really! It’s a series I would really love to receive submissions from members past and present. Not least because I haven’t been there for every great moment, like Paul’s 106 not out against Britannic Lodge in 2008 or the infamous 2007 Beano to Brighton. So this is an open invitation to send in your stories, whether it’s about your best innings, best bowling figures, favourite match, or best night out. They can be something from last week or decades ago. If you’ve got an Anson moment you would like to write about please send it in to me.

Psycho’s brilliant idea?

I’m going to kick this series off with our infamous effort in the Bertie Joel Trophy in 2003 against the Middlesex Tamils. Or as we called them, Sri Lanka, because they were so good.

As far as I know Anson has only ever played friendly cricket. But ahead of the 2003 season Dave ‘Pyscho’ Wright had suggested that we enter a cup competition. It was agreed that this might be a good idea to try something different and test ourselves against a truly competitive opposition.

The quest for silverware was on. We entered the first round of the BJ Cup against the Tamils, who battered first. 368 runs later the feeling was that perhaps this was not such a good idea after all.

It’s fair to say we had underestimated the calibre of the teams that would enter this trophy. The records seem to show that clubs like Hornchurch, South Wooodford, Cambridge CC, and many others had entered their 1st XI teams.

We bowled

We had a really strong bowling unit back then with Greg, Paul Evans, and Monky often winning us matches with the ball. They had absolutely no joy with the ball that day. Strangely it was Alf who took 3 wickets in this match including a bowled and a caught behind. It’s fair to say that it wasn’t from one that spun sharply and whizzed past the edge of the bat. Clearly, the Tamils were not used to Alf’s lollipops and probably got in a tizz not knowing whether to hit him for 4 or 6 each delivery. Even I had pretty reasonable figures in the context of this game. Mickey Smaldon missed a stumping off me and the disappointment still twinges occasionally like an old shrapnel wound.

We were put to the sword. They hit the ball hard, far, and often. Still, we have to praise the magnanimity of the Tamils as they effectively declared with 2 balls of their innings to go. This was a 45 over per side game. They’d seen enough to think that 368 would be a winning total. The Tamils had 3 half centurions and one full centurion who top scored with 114.

We batted

Me and Lee Gilbert opened our batting and got off to a decent start but nowhere near the required run rate. We had decided that a genuine chase was futile and that we would play to enjoy what we could. These were the days when we were more accustomed to batting for draws. The advice from Monky and Greg was to keep them out in the field for as long as we could. They should enjoy the late April weather for 45 overs as we had.

The Tamils had sussed the situation out and were holding back a bit. They let 8 different bowlers bowl that day. They were still pretty pacy and had good skills. Like these days I only really scored from back foot shots. I remember picking up quickly on a leg sidish short ball and anticipated playing my favourite pull shot. I was getting into position to hoik it over square leg as the ball pitched but it cut away and ended up going past my head outside off stump leaving me in a very awkward state.

Eventually I was out caught trying to drive through the air off the front foot. A shot I couldn’t play competently then and still can’t now. Lee batted very nicely for 50 and Michael Rowe scored a rapid 44.

Paul and Greg had already had a torrid day with the ball and they both followed this up with ducks. To prove that the Anson universe truly was upside down that day Alf scored 11 to go with his 3 wickets and Psycho (career batting average of 6) scored 21 off 22 balls. 

In the end we scored a credible 194, just 174 runs short of the target. Our 12th heaviest defeat by runs in our history.

The aftermath

Modern day sports players would come out and say ‘we go again’, or ‘we’ll learn from this’. Well, we learnt a valuable lesson that day which was to stick in your own lane. We never entered into any major organised competitive cricket again. We gave Psycho an earful in The Royal Oak afterwards for posing the ridiculous suggestion in the first place. This wasn’t a stage in our history where we gave out regular shellackings but we didn’t enjoy being on the end of them either.

To be fair we made a good go of the situation. As Greg said in one of his blogs, the Tamil’s prowess didn’t stop Monky offering a few quips and telling them they were shit when they hit clean sixes. The Tamils seemed to appreciate the well natured banter. They clearly enjoyed the experience because they asked if they could have a fixture with us the following season. I think we said we would think about it but our fixture secretary wisely lost their contact number.

The Tamils were drawn against South Woodford in the 2nd round, who conceded the game. Possibly the news of our demolishing had travelled the few miles down the A406. The records are a bit sketchy but it appears that Waltham CC were the winners of the trophy that year. Our opportunity for silverware was over quickly. But with fixtures against old foes such as May & Baker, Bentley, Britannic Lodge, and Waltham Cross Rosedale in our calendar we had bigger fish to fry that year.

Your Anson moments contributions

And that was that for our one and only foray into a major cup competition. I would love to hear some comments from others involved in that game. 

As I mentioned at the top, if you’ve got any memorable Anson moments then please do get in touch.