Godalming now awake and smelling coffee

Having scoured the Godalming and District Electoral Register, GCC had assembled the kind of motley crew Captain Blackbeard would have been proud of for this first home fixture in the Surrey County 2nd XI Premier league.

Coaxed out of retirement, Blogger Haine was asked to open the bowling with veteran giant John Milner behind the sticks, trying to stop those straying down leg side. Like a champion angler with amnesia, Skipper Churaman could find neither his line nor length from the other end. It look a moment of magic to break the deadlock with Warlingham on 20 after 5 overs. Swooping down in the covers like a hungry Busbridge eagle was Francis Johnson. He must have been on some kind of biltong-bonus for this game; his majestic direct hit took batsman Sherwani, and most of us, by complete surprise. Next, Haine trapped Edwardian country gent Denham Earl LBW for 4. The Doctors were on their way. Carsten Horne evoked images of Beefy striding in to deliver ball-after-ball of cleverly directed cherries. He bagged 2 for 39 off his 9 with ball magnet Jonty Johnson catching both Sandip, and Chetun Patel (56). Runs seemed hard to come by.

Charlston Dukes was also grappling with the cherry for the first time in 2017 and aided his campaign to rise up through the family rankings from 3rd best by usefully picking up the wickets of Rathnayake (bowled, 25) and Tilakarathne (2, caught Horne) from the Steve Davis Crown Green Bowling Assoc. end. On the clubhouse balcony, watching in unity, stood social media addicts John Dukes, Nick Horne and also Rocky, the latter attired as Martin Bell. It looked like a local TV debate on the forthcoming election and we hoped they were keeping the conversation away from politics.

With Eddowes and promising youngster Hitchcock covering good yardâge in the field, Steve 'Pammy' Anderson chipped in with his own brand of cutters. He had Punjabi and Amin, both for ducks, courtesy of Safehands Johnson and Haine, respectively. Warlingham finished on 167 - 9 from their 45 overs.

In riposte, the Mingers got off to a solid start. Surrey over-50s run machine Garry Sewell was hitting cover drives with attitude his great uncle Brian, the art critic, would have described as "...'throbbing gauntlet' style mixing Delacroix-like impudence to dispatch with some quite unremarkable bowling". Gazzlesticks was bowled for 45, with Clive (Anderson) adding 31 and Milner 42. With what appeared to be a run chase formality (120 - 3), Dukes, Haine and Johnson conspired to add a measly 7 before Churaman, who'd now found his bait, steadied the ship (11 n.o.). It was wonderful to watch debutant Thomas Woodgates, watched by his family, who trebled the attendance figures (and bar takings ;-]), smack the winning runs (168 - 6, off 41.4), gloriously over the top and give us hope that the next generation of batsmen has arrived.

GODALMING WIN BY 3 WKTS.

(Scroll down for scorecard)