Scorecard

St Albans Cricket Club Sunday 2nd XI v Salmagundi Gardeners CC on Mon 25 Aug 2025 at 2pm
St Albans Cricket Club Lost

Match report With the 2025 season in its twilight weeks, the Sunday 2XI’s annual Bank Holiday fixture arrives. Having lost this fixture last year and thus losing an impressive streak with it, our motley crew were driven towards reclaiming the crown and beginning the streak anew.

Thus, our mighty Saints took up the bat, opening with the combined might of two of our youth contingent: Daiwik Khedekar and Zac Johnson. Both lads started well, showing due respect to the bowling and dispatching the bad balls when they came. Daiwik would end on 15, while Zac would finish on 10, ushering Sulaiman ‘Suli’ Nisar and Matt ‘Shadow’ Shadwick to the crease.

Suli cemented himself as the best Nisar in the club early on, his shot of choice for today seemingly being the dab. He batted with composure and tact, picking his shots well and finding the boundary with regularity. Shadow got unlucky, deciding to give out some catching practice down the leg side and departing for a well made nought.

Club legend Ciarán Walsh then approached, asking every fielder he passed whether they had driven there today, and if so then they should move their cars lest he put one through their windscreens. He then shocked the masses by actually blocking a few, then played a few to - you guessed it - the leg side. He hit a couple of nice doubles, struck a clean four into the bushes, then got excited and found himself bowled for 8. Suli would depart a while later on a brilliantly-made 45, allowing Peter Melling and Ben Hingston to take up arms.

Peter hit some lovely shots, executing cover drives of a quality unbeknownst to most cricketers, eventually felled on 8. Hingston was in more of a rush, bullying the bowlers and worrying passers-by in the fashion Walsh claimed he was going to. He breezed to the 50 milestone with his usual aplomb, sauntering off the pitch in retirement. He was delighted to see his wife had arrived, then dismayed to discover that she had only rocked up in time to see him walk off the pitch and ask the scorers “Christ is he out already?”

Injured hero Andy Melling then joined the fray, accompanied by Debshali ‘Debs’ Sinharoy. Melling had thrown out his back after one too many deadlifts, sobbing to his teammates “I’ll never have biceps like Hingston now.” Cracking bum though Andy, and by God did it shine when he batted. Some lovely shots saw him amass a respectable 27, while Debs batted with his usual class, terrifying fielders and wrapping up on a fluent 19. The remaining overs were seen out by skipper Nauman ‘Manny’ Nisar and a reintroduced Hingston, since number 11 Prath ‘PK’ Khatavkar was having a poo and very much not padded up. Consternation from the fielding side followed Hingston’s return, but all fears were allayed when he decided to only score one more. Manny wrapped up the innings on 16*, signalling the arrival of the real reason everyone was there: the Tavah rolls.

Well-fed and eager to defend a respectable score of 216, 10 of our fielders took to the pitch. Our 11th fielder was delayed, having firstly been caught napping on a sofa as his teammates took to the pitch, then hurriedly going into the changing rooms to grab his spikes, and swiftly being hit in the face by a door, causing a nosebleed that lasted for 40 minutes. It was by far the shot of the day, and we can safely assume that the fielding standard only went downhill once Walsh had recovered enough to return to this pitch.

While Walsh was busy trying not to aggravate any more doors, our opening spell of PK and Debs were getting underway. The pair bowled (what I assume were) lovely spells, keeping things tight and ensuring runs were hard to come by in a tough chase. An early wicket for Debs brought the Salmagundi number 3 to the crease, who proved to ultimately be our downfall. The man set about dispatching every bowler that sent a ball his way, finding the boundary with ease and clearly being the big hitter of his side. It was clear from the off: he’s got to go if we want a chance here.

The first bowling change brought Shadow and Daiwik, the latter bowling a ridiculously good spell. Our youth contingent were the toast of our bowling performances, Daiwik being virtually unplayable and securing some much-needed wickets to keep us in the game. Shadow ably supported him from the Knill-Jones end, claiming a wicket of his own with a cracking in-swinger. It’s also worth noting while the youth were the toast of our bowling, Shadow was the toast of our fielding. Letting virtually nothing through him against a batter that made boundaries look easy, before taking two sublime catches, he was a big factor in us eking out the game to keep a chance alive. He ultimately took an absolute screamer of a catch off Daiwik to dismiss the intimidating number 3, to raucous celebrations from his teammates and Walsh bellowing “THE HERO WE NEED” before Shadow had actually caught the ball. A number of us contemplated giving a massive sendoff to said batter, given he had decided to: have a proper go at his fielders in the first innings while he bowled pump, celebrated ridiculously exuberantly for a good minute when reaching the 50 (and not retiring despite us having done so before), celebrating ridiculously exuberantly for a good two minutes when hitting the 100, STILL not retiring, then celebrating ridiculously exuberantly for another minute after hitting a 6 off a literal child. Sharp words from Andy put him to rights, and we ultimately maintained our class, allowing no sendoffs and Andy even buying him a pint in the bar after the game. We consider ourselves good friends of Salmagundi, and we know they’re a lovely bunch of blokes, this behaviour far from representative of their club. Hitting 100 is a big deal, and we have no arguments with celebrating; however, there’s a certain way of doing things, and in this very friendly bank holiday fixture, batting against children, if you’re not going to retire on 100 after we retired on 50, at least show some level of decorum by not screaming and whooping and swinging the bat around your head like a lunatic.

Anyway, back to the game. Zac and Suli came on to try their hands, finding immediate reward on a tricky pitch, stalling the score for some time by throwing the set batters off their rhythm. Zac was unfortunate to retire wicketless, thanks to a game-losing drop from Walsh at mid-off to allow the aforementioned number 3 to continue. Suli found more reward, taking 2 excellent wickets in his initial spell. Walsh cameoed for an over, got pumped for 12 and was dragged off immediately. It’s a tough day at the office when the best part of Walsh’s game was his batting, and he clearly had forgotten how to play the game after that.

Suli and Daiwik saw out the remainder of our overs, with a sharp wicket from Suli suddenly putting us back in the game. Only 9 required off 9 overs, but one more wicket secures the win for the Saints. The final bats didn’t look in fine touch, so it truly was anyone’s game. Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be, the opposition hitting a lovely four to seal the win for the Gardeners.

Overall, a lovely day out, with our entire team showing a huge amount of heart in what was a tough innings. Tempers may have flared, but hands were shaken all round and a beer shared by all in the club afterwards with plenty of laughs and good-natured banter. It’s a real testament to the spirit of the team to continue playing so well in the face of a seemingly unstoppable force, and it’s incredibly encouraging to see our youth contingent play such a crucial role in our bowling attack. Big congratulations to Hingston for adding another Clarence Park 50 to his ever-growing collection, and the “Shot of the Day” award has only one clear recipient: the changing room door that slapped Walsh in the nose to take him out of action for the first portion of the second innings.

St Albans Cricket Club Sunday 2nd XI Batting
Player Name RunsMB4s6sSRCtStRo
extras
TOTAL :
2nb 6w 6b 2lb 
for 8 wickets
16
215		        
Daiwik Khedekar Bowled  15 17 2 88.24
Zac (Isaac) Johnson Stumped  10 34 29.41
Sulaiman Nisar Bowled  45 69 6 65.22
Matt Shadwick Caught  0 4 0
Ciarán Walsh Bowled  8 13 1 61.54
Peter Melling Bowled  8 15 53.33
Ben Hingston Not Out  51 36 7 141.67
Andrew Melling Bowled  27 27 3 100
Debshali Sinharoy Caught  19 16 1 118.75
Nauman Nisar Not Out  16 14 1 114.29
Prath Khatavkar  

Salmagundi Gardeners CC Bowling

Player nameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
No records to display.

Salmagundi Gardeners CC Batting
Player name RMB4s6sSR
extras
TOTAL :
2nb 11w 11b  
for 9 wickets
24
219 (36.0 overs)		     
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

St Albans Cricket Club Sunday 2nd XI Bowling

Player NameOversMaidensRunsWicketsAverageEconomy
Prath Khatavkar8.023000.003.75
Debshali Sinharoy6.0043143.007.17
Matt Shadwick3.0029129.009.67
Daiwik Khedekar8.0234311.334.25
Zac (Isaac) Johnson5.004100.008.20
Sulaiman Nisar5.011936.333.80
Ciarán Walsh1.001200.0012.00