Effigies are a team from London who play six or seven games a season, one of them a touring match and, in true Richard Clare mode, they go to a different country every year and to date have never returned, not, I would add because of their unruly behaviour. They have toured to countries where MCC has not yet been such as Estonia, France, Iceland and Malta.
They provided two umpires for both innings, one of them (Bob Eaton) played for the British Lions in Bulawayo during the South African tour of 1974 and the other (Hugh Ellerton) was wearing a pair of deckchair design trousers owned at one time by Elton John. How he came by them no-one knows and no-one really wishes to know.
As the Effigies had suffered from a number of baillages three MCC members – O`Connor, Soundararajan and Jadwani – volunteered to play for them to make a game of two ten-a-side teams.
Captain Clare won the toss and chose to bat in a 30 over friendly and sent in O`Meagher and Fudge to begin the innings. Fudge started well but was soon out in the fourth over having scored 5 from 7 balls and made way for keeper Garner who hung around until the ninth over before being bowled for 6 off 13 balls. In came Wright for his last innings at the Hirschanger before returning to Australia. He and O`Meagher put on a good partnership of 31 for the third wicket but eventually Wright went for 14 off 20 balls with the total on 68. Captain Clare came to the crease and put on 27 for the fourth wicket together with O`Meagher but was bowled by West for 21 in the 18th over. Hobbs shared a partnership of 19 for the fifth wicket before being caught for 7 off 17 in the 23rd over. Next in was Michahelles for his first innnings ever. He faced five balls before being bowled by Jadwani and joining the duck race – three balls more than I faced to get the same score in my first game for the MCC. Blades and O`Meagher put on another 11 for the seventh wicket but Blades was caught O`Connor in the 27th over with the score on 127. Scott joined O`Meagher and they put on an unbeated 30 runs for the eight wicket, Scott doubling his aggregate and average for the season and O`Meagher cementing his place at the top of the batting statistics. Throughout the innings O`Connor had showed that Sarma cannot be complacent about his title of master sledger
Plentiful teas were provided by Jadwani and O’Connor and included some uncooked eggs, a definite first in the MCC catering history.
After the break, Scott and Blades opened the bowling for MCC and bowled their full allocations straight off, Blades taking two wickets and, after 12 overs, Effigies were 45 for 2 (MCC had been 56 for 2 at the same stage). Clare and Wright took over for three overs each, kept the run-rate below that required and after 18 overs Effigies were 80 for 2 (MCC had been 95 for 4 down). Kavi, fresh from his 3 for 2 last week came on with Garner but was tonked for 24 off 2 overs – cricket can be a soul destroying game. After 22 overs Effigies were 120 for 2 (MCC had been 109 for 4) so the captain brought on a very nervous secret weapon named Hobbs. He and Garner almost did it, Effigies losing another four wickets, one of them the Effigies top scorer, caught by Michahelles, a superb catch in his first game, before scoring the winning run off 29.3 overs.
An enjoyable, friendly, but competitive match, with some wonderful sledging by O`Connor, finished at around 5.30 pm allowing us plenty of time to attack Helmut`s cool fresh before retiring to the Chinese Tower.
O`Meagher, 68*
Fudge, 5, caught
Garner, 6 bowled, 5.3 overs, 0 mdns, 37 runs, 1 wkt
Wright, 14, bowled, 3 overs, 0 mdns, 16 runs, 0 wkts, 1 catch
Clare, 21, bowled, 3 overs, 0 mdns, 14 runs, 0 wkts
Hobbs, 7, caught, 4 overs, 0 mdns, 12 runs, 2 wkts
Michahelles, 0, bowled, 1 catch
Blades, 6, caught, 6 overs, 0 mdns, 22 runs, 2 wkts
Scott, 12*, 6 overs, 0 mdns, 20 runs, 0 wkts,
Kavi, DNB, 2 overs, 0 mdns, 24 runs, 0 wkts.
MCC, 157 for 7 lost to Effigies, 158 for 6 by 3 wickets.
MCC MOM O`Meagher
