St Peters Dad vs Carib Beer XI, Battersea Park,

Wednesday 20th May 2026

The Caribs first outing of 2026 was down in Battersea Park, favourite ground of Carib Captain and Chairman Martin who was not in attendance. A few other Caribs were also absent, which as well as impacting their chances of a Personality of the Year vote meant that we only numbered 9. Fortunately for the opposition they had 2 spare players, so we were up to a full team of 11. Unfortunately for the Dads they then had a dropout and an injury so they ended up with 9.

Despite all the switching between teams a toss eventually happened, which was lost by skipper for the day Carib Weaver, so the Caribs were sent out to field. At this point Caribs Cordey and Holmes had yet to arrive so we had to borrow a fielder for the first few overs and so were a man short in the field. Potentially this led to a few runs being scored from the normally economical Carib opening pair of Carib Kant and new member for this season Carib Khairnar. However just a couple of overs in the pair of Caribs Cordey and Holmes were spotted walking around the boundary, looking like they were out for a nice evening stroll, rather than walking with the purpose of 2 men late for a cricket match. Eventually after 4 overs for Carib, Northern Pie Bakery Magnate, Cordey was deemed ready to enter the field, after another over Carib Holmes also joined so we were finally up to our full complement of 11.

Given no time to warm up at all Phil was thrown the ball to start bowling his left arm darts, the lack of preparation maybe leading to 10 being conceded from his first over. However Phil showed a calm head in his opening spell to enact a run out.

The early run out was to prove to be the only breakthrough for some time in the Dads innings with them cruising to a total of 100-1 from 14 overs. Now desperate for some wickets and aided by the Dads top order batters needing to retire the Caribs turned to Ringer for the day, Ben who was gamely taking on the role of encouraging the Caribs. Ringer Ben duly delivered a couple of wickets thanks to fine catches from Caribs Kant and Banarjee. This led to an incredible flurry of wickets with Carib Swanand returning to the attack and taking 3 wickets in the next over, leaving the Dads at 105-6 from 16 overs. Quite the middle order collapse.

This inspired the returning Carib Khairnar to take his first wicket as a Carib member, and Carib Cordey given the 20th over rolled back the years ending with good figures of 2-23. So somehow the Caribs had managed to restrict the Dads to 120, so just a run-a-ball needed for a rare chance of victory for the Caribs in this fixture.

Caribs Alex and Rishi were our opening pair who struggled to get away the opening bowlers of the Dads, so there were 2 maidens in the first few overs. Carib Holmes did manage to find the boundary, but perhaps emboldened by this was then immediately out. Caribs Rishi and Ringer Jonny also had difficulty in troubling the scorers before they were out in the first half of the innings with the Caribs just 27/3 at the half way stage, somewhat below the required run rate. Ringer Ben had spent much of this first half of the Carib innings, muttering "come on Caribs it's not a test match" a chorus that was eventually joined by Carib Kant in no uncertain terms. However perhaps with these words ringing in their ears Caribs Cordey and Bowen both had short innings ending with ducks. Carib Bowen particularly unfortunate to be caught by sub fielder Carib Holmes.

At this point Carib Berry and Ringer Ben set about trying to up the scoring a little and put together a mini partnership to move the score on a little. Sadly, Carib Berry was unusually forced to retire out, thanks to the vagaries of the UK Rail network (if only we knew someone with connections there). Caribs Kunal and Moss also did little to aid the efforts of the Caribs leaving us on 62/8 with 4 overs to go and a heavy defeat surely guaranteed. The highlight of the innings at this point had seemed to be the appearance of a duck* (sorry, an Egyptian Goose - see photo), which certainly was ominous for those Caribs who had a zero/duck/Egyptian goose against their name on the scorecard. Eventually the duck (sorry, Egyptian goose) was shooed from the outfield by Carib Holmes on the field as a game sub for the opposition.

Carib Kant was now at the crease and in a last wicket partnership with Carib Weaver. No doubt having to follow his own advice Swanand very much got a move on with an incredible innings including 6 boundaries and several 2s and 3s. This left the Caribs incredibly with an outside chance of victory with 24 needed from the final over. The over started well with 4 runs and a no-ball, meaning the target was 19 from 5 and there was genuine hope for the Carib team. The Dads team were now noticeably quiet fearing they might grasp defeat from the jaws of victory. Alas it was not to be, with Swanand unable to find any more boundaries, but his heroics led to a respectable defeat by just 11 runs.

So not a good start to the season, but it was a game played in good spirits with the Dads willing to help us out when short of players. So a few Caribs trotted off to the local pubs for a post match de-brief looking forward to our next match

Carib Beer XI Lose by 11 Runs

Scorecard