St Clements Strollers 18 June 2025

Manager Ayaaz Mallick

Captain Richard Pye

Lost by 6 wickets

SOA 182 for 7

St Clements Strollers 183 for 4

A lovely, warm, evening for the game at Magdalen College Sports Ground. After a managed toss (with batsmen retiring at the end of the over that they reach 35), SOA batted first. The Strollers are renowned for their, at times, idiosyncratic approach to bowling. Their generally gentle, mostly accurate, bowling rather withered against an SOA onslaught with the bat. Jason Haynes (retired on 37) and Sam Down (34) enjoyed a great day at the office with 13 boundaries between them. Luke Wyatt, an SOA debutant, was out first ball, playing attackingly. The pace of scoring barely relented with a series of strong innings to follow, with Arsalan Khattak retiring on 35 off 13 balls – with a great anchoring innings from Azlan Shariff carrying his bat for 32 awith nice cameos from Rory Nicholson, Sameer Hashimi and Hamzah Shah. We were buoyant at the turn, with a total of 182 runs – and a less than happy opposition captain who did not appear to have enjoyed the barrage.

However, the Strollers are a well-oiled machine at their Marston home, with its tight boundaries and lightning outfield. A strong upper order used our pace against us to plunder a rather good seam attack - with two of their players retiring not out. The figures for Ishwar Karthick and Irtaza Quresh (IQ) do not convey the aggression with which they bowled – IQ bowled their skipper for 10 and had an edge dropped, whilst Ishwar’s bowling was venomous at times. Luke Wyatt, in a cameo over, took our third wicket but was otherwise treated unmercifully by their incoming number 7 batter who took 20 of his 35 runs in one over! Nine overs and 122 runs later, the damage had been done. The run rate slowed as we made our way down the order as Hamzah, Arsalan and Azlan contributed with the ball. The winning run came from a wide in the 18th over off Richard Pye’s bowling. Nicholson and Khattak took catches safely, but we missed a number of chances that could have edged things our way. Nonetheless, an enjoyable evening for onlookers and batters (with a total of 54 boundaries – including 5 sixes – in less than 38 overs), with participation from every member of the SOA team. Thanks to Bharat (manager) for putting together such a strong team for this entertaining fixture and thanks and well wishes to Junaid for asking me to captain in his stead, as he was unable to play.

Richard Pye