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Chantilly won the toss (Oakley is going through a purple patch with the coin over these last weeks) and decided to field – and see how the wicket played.

It didn’t take long for Regan to break through, bowling Ashok for 1. But the Aulnay batsmen resisted well and managed to edge up the score albeit slowly. Mohan was caught behind by Jack Oakley, clenching the ball none too convincingly between his elbows and belly.

With several Chantilly bowlers out of action for the day, bowling duties were sprinkled around with GE stand-ins Chan, Tyson and Prashant all turning the arm over, the latter picking up 3 valuable wickets. Josh Pursey had a couple of overs as well and despite struggling with his line in his 1st over, showed fortitude and future potential in his much better 2nd over.

No Aulnay batsman scored higher than 16 but together they pushed the score at the end of the 30 overs to 103. Jimmy Regan was the most successful home-grown Chantilly player with a tidy 3 for 11 off his 6 overs. Richardson picked up 2 wickets, both bowled, plus threw a direct-hit run out to remove Siva late on in the innings.

Indian sweet tea and some delicious spicy snacks were provided in the break between innings by the Aulnay crew. Nice bunch of chaps they are!

Tyson and the recently-promoted Regan opened Chantilly’s account with the bat. And they started off very well indeed, reaching 30 in only the 5th over, before Tyson was adjudged leg-before. This was just the start we needed, but little did we know that we had seen the best of the batting.

Heard could only add 2 more and hadn’t yet removed his box before Rob Oakley quit the field and finished his season with a duck. Mind you, there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell of not getting out to that ball! Regan was out a couple of overs later for CCC’s top score of 12… Now we needed 59 from 20 overs with 6 wickets left. That really shouldn’t be too difficult, but do you sense where this is heading… again?

Batsmen came and went, none adding more than 3 (Prashant) to the score. Nothing much memorable or positive comes to mind during this period other than a light shower. The umpires got their light meters out, but it was to no avail – the game had to go on. The Chantilly batsmen couldn’t hit the ball, but it wasn’t a problem of light.

With a collapse to match the one we had in Chantilly against Aulnay in June, we lost the last 8 wickets for 18 runs. We can take solace in the fact that we do wonders for the Aulnay bowling figures though: Kannan 3 for 7; Vinoth 3 for 2. But after 19 overs we could pack up and go looking for the remnants of our cars.

As a town, Aulnay doesn’t have the best of reputations for us posh northerners. For most of the afternoon a group of youths were hanging around not far from where we had parked the cars. You half-expected to return to a smoking shell at the end of the game. On the other hand, it was nice that they laid on a display of motorcycling skills for us – performing wheelies up and down the street - and we were honoured to have a motorcycle drive-past across the outfield later on in the game.
On the way home we drove through an almighty downpour, as if to remind us that the summer was ending.

The flat end to this game was not a true reflection on the rest of the season. We’ll work out the stats later but it’s certain we’ve won more games this year than any in the past. Well done to all involved – we can look forward to more clowning around (outside) next April.