Monday, June 11, 2007

Brew in a teapot

A muted Dazzler showing in South London, against capable and very appealing opponents. Could it be the Private Is' very niceness was what made it so hard for us to get into gear, and challenge them? Whatever: we all gave due attention when they explained which distant hedges would be ground-rule doubles and which remote, barely-visible, features home runs – and then slapped grounder after grounder tamely to 3B/SS, whose sharp throws were held with ease by their superb first basewoman.

Baseball (or softball) is the game where the defence always has the ball; and we did indeed see plenty of it. New pitcher Lance Nelson stuck in there, but the windy Wandsworth night and tight umpiring calls made it hard to throw strikes, so a succession of walks allowed Private Is to get runners on ready for their big hitters. When our defence settled down a bit, fine catches from Heather at short RF, from Karen and Amy at the plate, and Rob steaming in from the deep outfield, kept us within touch. Encouraging too were some tight tags and outs around 2nd base, as Amy, Tania, and Jack worked closely together, showing the benefit of all those training drills.

But, once Tania’s first inning run had been countered, we were always trailing: 10-3 after 3, and increasing. Rob Tona dug deep for a two-out three-run shot in the top of the fifth, and then Lance shut the I’s out in the bottom of that inning (overcoming me bundling into him on the mound as he held on to the ball for the third out) but it wasn’t quite the rally we needed….

Most dazzling moment was undoubtedly captain Tim Jaffier’s single-handed double play in the 4th, when juggling an easy infield blooper to bobble in, out, in again, fumbling, bobbling - then at last, the catch finally held, stretching out to tag a baserunner, who, mesmerised (weren’t we all?) by Tim’s antics, forgot to dart away. Tim also turned the final out in that inning (OK, on a different play, this time), and claimed runs both on a neat sliding double in the third, and after some devil-may-care hustle, breezing straight past the third baseman, and no doubt spurning base-coach warnings, in the 5th. And he was captain for the night. So where was the poor guy’s JD and Coke, when the teapot of beer was served up?

(Not sure why a teapot. Is this a South London thing?)
Finsbury Dazzlers 1 1 1 0 3 0 3 - 9
Private I's 3 3 4 3 0 5 x - 18

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