The sun was shinning and the grass was green as the old boy's turned up to the less than salubrious surroundings of Horefield for the fixture versus A & S Police / DEFRA. A few Old Boy's were nursing hangovers from the previous day's cider fuelled shenanigans at England's victory over Australia. One Old boy was missing in action - Mr Paul Meredith Ashford was nowhere to be seen. Rumours of a potato crisis at Pawsons are as yet unconfirmed. An 11th hour call was answered by Anth.

We were greeted by an unprepared pitch and a very odd young man who formed part of the opposition. More on him later.

The toss didn't involve a coin, or any semblance of normality, with the opposition electing them selves to bat second due to a number of their team "having places to go". Unless you want to "fall down some stairs" You don't disagree with policemen.

Messrs EC Davies and SJ Smith opened the batting and found the tight bowling hard to get away. Smith in particular unlucky to see some well timed shots finding the fielder. His pre innings boast of "I'm going to go in there and smash" not quite coming off. After 10 overs Smith was in the pavilion having been caught at point for 8 and HOB were 30-1 from 10 overs. Davies and Brown were at the crease and the tight line and length continued, Davies eventually falling LBW for 19. This caused a few eye brows to be raised, there were strict instructions for our umpires: "No LBW's under any circumstances" Not something that should be shared with the world wide web you may think, but if the skipper is happy to say it with the opposition captain stood next to him, then I think we're o.k. Probably still angered at his instructions going unheard, Smith was in and out quicker than he could say "unplayable in swinging yorker". The scorers weren't troubled.

Ogilvie in next. Between hopeful swishes and fortuitous edges were a few nice shots from Brown and Ogilvie and the Old Boy's upped the run rate. With only a couple of overs left Ogilvie got a top edge that came down with snow on it and was easily taken by the keeper. Out for 16. Brown didn't last too much longer, cleaned bowl for a vital 30. Adams and Ashley "The turbonater" Fillingham saw out the last of the overs to nudge the Old Boys to 81-5.

Could have been worse, but we'd have to bowl like demons to have any chance of protecting a small total on a smallish pitch.

The A & S Police / DEFRA openers set out their stall with the first Brown ball being dispatched to the boundary for 4. Lots of big, big shots followed for the next 4 overs with Brown and Ogilvie being dispatched to all parts of the ground - 40 plus was on the board at the end of the 4th over. Such Police aggression has not been seen since Rodney King p1ssed off LA's finest. The bowling was not great, but conversely not THAT bad. It became clear that Williams was the man that had somewhere to go. If the ground had one, the scoreboard would have struggled to keep up. After a quick fire 38 he retired (probably) to his hot tub and trio of nympho's.

By now, demoralised by the onslaught - Old man Clements in particular being singled out for fetch on more occasions than he cared for - collective spirits were sagging. The captain was distraught, his already clairvoyant fielding placements became increasingly unreadable "over there, and two on the boundary" Where there was, who the two were and which boundary, were left to interpretation. If it hadn't deserted him many years ago he would've been pulling his hair out.

Some light relief for the demoralised HOB came in the shape of the previously mentioned odd young man. He possessed an extraordinary repertoire of two shots; the explosive slog or the exaggerated leave. Strange noises of irritation were emitting from our esteemed captain as he left ball, after ball that was missing by the target by the narrowest of margins. It was fairly clear he didn't posses much cricketing no-how, or any chromosomes that differed from just the one family line. The swamps of Horefield had thrown up a right one here. It wasn't long before he left one too many - his middle stump hit and the bails displaced. This outcome, the news that his father was also his brother and the look of shock on his inbred face, was expected as keenly as our impending defeat.

Victory was wrapped up in 12 overs but the Old Boy's live to fight another day. Hopefully with a greater degree of success.