OSCC, 71 all out, got about halfway against Leverstock Green, 155 all out iPad At the captain's request (for a direct line please dial 0-9 for Wardy) I'm not allowed to mention what effect Saturday's result has had on our survival prospects. However, I think I am free to point out this challenging mathematical poser, namely what would happen if you took the points we have accumulated in the Bedfordshire league (depleted by 10 after Sunday's concession) and added them to those we have accumulated in the Saracens League? Answer: we'd still be pretty severely fucked.... Things did not begin well on Saturday.  Richie Barker missed out with a nasty toe injury (laughably sustained attempting to bowl seam in the nets) and Danny O'Brien was forced to withdraw on the morning of the match after a tough week at work. Roger Piepenstock, a man who lives within a stone's throw of the ground, although perhaps not if that stone is being thrown by an Offley fielder, subseq

  An interesting weekend full of landmark performances and season's-best efforts from a number of players resulted in a familiar feeling - Offley lost twice and lurched a step nearer to a second successive double relegation campaign. On the grounds that there's as much chance of us fulfilling the final fixture at Godmanchester as there is of Luke Munt buying a Luton Town season ticket (not to mention as much chance of us winning it as of Luke Munt renouncing sausage rolls), we are already effectively doomed to relegation from the Bedfordshire League. The hithero uncharted depths of Division Six await - nice one JB. On Friday night Offley pulled off one of the best wins of the season by routing (sort of) a strong Ickwell side featuring a number of 1st & 2nd XI players. Of course everyone who turns out for Offley is a 1st XI player (sometimes a 1st VIII or 1st IX player) so perhaps it wasn't such an upset. Oscar Welch became the youngest player in club history to claim fi

  In 1859 the American abolitionist John Brown was executed after the doomed raid on Harper's Ferry, an event that sparked the American Civil War. This act inspired the song John Brown's Body Lies A Moldering In The Grave with it's world-renowned chorus of Glory, Glory, Hallelujah . Today, we remember John Brown, known to his followers as the Wrathful Cloud of God, and his famous tune and pay tribute to a contemporary cricketer with this, The Ballad of the Broken Batsman. The Ballad of the Broken Batsman He walked out to the middle for he'd looked death in the eye Doctors told him to retire but he said he'd have another try He hoped that he'd be served up with a tasty juicy pie Now he ain't gonna bat no more (Chorus) Glory, glory hallelujah The bowler ripped it right back through ya It was hitting middle stump but you stomped off with the hump Said you ain't gonna bat no more He took his guard and settled in, he waited for the ball His eyes lost all exp

 OSCC, 118 all out, beat Old Albanians, 110 all out, by eight runs On the day that Luke Munt (pictured ablove) called time on his illustrious cricketing career, selling off his kit to raise money for charity (unfortunately it failed ro raise nearly as many pounds as Luke weighs - if it had we might have cured cancer), Offley recorded their second win of the Saracens campaign with a pulsating victory against the odds and Old Albanians. Richie Barker, captain for the first time since the first victory against Albanians on June 1st, won the toss and elected to bat. Barker got off the mark for the first time in three innings but was out moments later, leading to more observations on retirement, or at the very least dropping down the order. His opening partner, Offley MVP Jamie Cummins, returned to the pavilion shortly afterwards as Offley slumped to 12-2. Ben Southgate and Steve Bexfield added 60 for the third wicket. Southgate reached double figures for Offley for the first time at the se

  The Ward Brothers (and Nine Deluxe Spanners), 143 all out, lost to Flamstead, 146-6, by 4 wickets Marc Ward won the toss. Adam Ward top-scored with 62. Offley lost. Some things don't change Well, the gap between Offley and safety only gets larger but at this stage of the season it's fair to say that ship has sailed. Or smashed into a fucking great iceberg. Confused by winning the toss, Ward decided to bat first on a slow, low deck that made Offley look like Perth. Tight bowling, a lack of bounce and a lack of form kept Offley quiet before Richie Barker perished for a 25-ball duck, paying the price for hitting the ball off the square. The only thing longer was the name of the bowler who got him out - one Thavin Sankana Thilakarathna Asurapmudalige. In contrast to Barker, Scott Boatwright, recently arrived back from Japan, batted with freewheeling panache to make 6 from 24 balls before lobbing a catch to cover. That brought the Ward Brothers together and they plundered a rapid

  OSCC, 143-9, lost to Rickmansworth, 201-6, by 58 runs Imagine a day where everything that could go wrong did go wrong, a day that ended with Offley dropping to the bottom of Division Nine West. And there you essentially have the story of Offley's latest defeat. It was a day that began with Offley in eighth place, still hopeful of chasing down Leverstock Green in seventh and avoiding yet another relegation. It somehow ended with them rock bottom of the table, staring up at not just Leverstock Green but also the hitherto hapless Old Albanians and Luton Indians, both of whom recorded upset victories elsewhere. It's hard to know where to start. With Marc Ward losing the toss and being invited to field? With Josh Scott making his way to the ground in the world's slowest uber, driven by a man who obeyed speed limits and traffic laws and missing the first two overs? With the returning Kaiz Ul Haq apparently forgetting his way to the ground and missing the first five overs? With

 OSCC, 164-8, beat Eaton Bray, 94 all out, by 70 runs Said Boaty unto Matty "It looks like you're the fatty" "It's weight of runs that matter  And I'm the better batter" And so they staged a duel To see if weight would conquer all Boaty went out first And if not quite at his worst He scratched around a bit And really looked quite shit He played and missed a lot The inside edge was his best shot Then an Offley wicket fell And Matty heard the bell His breasts were seen to jiggle As he marched out to the middle His arse dragging in his wake The result of eating so much cake Off the mark was Taylor swift He gave the run rate a quick lift And while Boaty joined the dots Matty T played all the shots The runs began to flow Though the running was quite slow They spread the field for Taylor He had no fear of failure He smashed the ball for four Then he smashed a couple more But soon was breathing hard Though he'd barely run a yard Then at the other end Boaty

  OSCC, 181-4, beat Old Albanians, 154-9, by 27 runs It might have taken a while but on a day where skipper Marc Ward was absent in a bid to seduce Snow White along with six similarly diminutive accomplices, Offley finally found a way to win a game. Perhaps it was because Old Albanians were even more hopeless than Offley; perhaps because even a blind squirrel sometimes finds an acorn and on this day Dan Goord located the middle of the bat; and perhaps the addition of Ben Southgate, someone who clearly knows what he is doing, combined to lead Offley to their first league victory of the season. For some reason Offley, a team who can at times consider themselves fortunate to play on a needle-strewn, dog-shit littered, pikey-infested council wasteland, found themsleves playing on one of the premier venues in Hertfordshire and raised their game accordingly. They might have found a way to drop eight catches (in fairness only four players shelled a catch but each of them compensated by droppi

  One of the great landmarks in cricket is to score 1000 first class runs before the end of May.  Only eight men have reached the milestone (Bradman did it twice) and no one has done it since Graeme Hick in 1988. This season Offley have got off to what might be politely termed a slow start - Stephen Hawking climbing Everest without assistance would have made swifter progress. Seven matches have been played and six defeats have been racked up, including five out of five in the league. Only a victory over the Shillington Spitfires has interrupted the run of losses. Apropos of nothing, Shillington's nickname of the Spitfires is worth taking on board for the next time we rebrand. Offley is named after King Offa, the man who ordered the construction of Offa's Dyke (Google it). Consequently is it not time to jettison the lion logo in favour of a new inclusive 21st century image, the Offley Dykes, complete with a logo of two lipstick lesbians doing what Offley do best? Going down....