Heading into July Offley find themselves in the familiar territory of mid-table obscurity.  It's not out of the question that a flurry of poor results could see them force their way into the relegation dogfight at the bottom of the Saracens League while last Sunday's defeat to cellar dwellers may well have deep-sixed any hopes of a promotion push in the Beds League. Finals day is admittedly only a game away in the Village Trophy but for the moment that's still an outlier on the horizon. And yet as we reach the height of summer, one batsman is gunning for glory, chasing a record that has never been achieved in the club's 25 years. Years ago Rizwan Hamid, a byword for batting blobs, notched four ducks in a row, ultimately finishing his career with 24 ducks in 75 innings. He did once make 42 before being run out in some style by Nathan Brodie but them's the breaks. Kieran Maher, the finest duck wrangler in Offley history, failed to score 11 times in 2013 but he gener...

  Many years ago, at the height of the hostilities between Offley and Nomads, someone (and despite what has been suggested down the years it wasn't me) coined the phrase Luke Munt Watford Cunt . Were they wrong? If one considers the photographic evidence above we see a man wearing a Watford top and a hat with a penis on it.  He does indeed look a bit of a cunt. Yet a lot of water has flowed under the bridge since the early days when Offley came into Munt's orbital sphere.  He's the size of a planet so why shouldn't he have his own orbit? It's a slightly moot point as to whether the water would be able to flow under the bridge if it was trying to transport Luke downstream - as like as not his imposing girth would make it difficult for anything to get under the bridge. In 2015 Munt made the switch from Nomads (via Hexton) and joined Offley. Since then he has scored over 2000 runs for Offley, taken nearly 50 wickets and pulled off a number of fantastic catches that bel...

  OSCC, 155-8, lost to Aldenham 156-4, by 6 wickets On a day that was somewhat overshadowed by a run out (and subsequent fall out) between Offley's opening batsmen, Josh Scott's Road Warriors produced another example of chronic travel sickness, one aided and abetted by another spectacular collapse.  The Road Warriors have now lost all four of their away trips in the Saracens League and while they remain undefeated at the bastion that is the Offley Cricket Ground their inability to win on their travels is starting to prove demoralising.  Offley went into battle with nine and a half men due to a combination of turf toe, Monster Trucks, the sulks, an unregistered Veg and a trip to Amsterdam. At one point they would be reduced to seven and a half men but no one knew that and if we had we would doubtless have stayed away. But we did not know. Captain Scott won the toss and elected to bat first on a surface that appeared likely to offer some bounce. That bounce was on display i...

  OSCC, 156-2, beat Bedford Under Nines)154 all out, by 8 wickets On a day when Luke Munt bowled for the first time since he was banned from doing so by the doctor, a day when Wayne Cutts came out of retirement for about the eighth time and a day when Steve Own finally held his first catch of the season (he dropped another one as well), Offley tightened their grip on second spot as they hammered the children of Bedford by eight wickets with 55 deliveries to spare. A game that never threatened to become a contest and was not as close as the final margin suggested saw Peter Gilkes and Jono Evetts take the honours for Offley as they sleepwalked their way to victory. Gilkes claimed the second five-wicket haul of his career, taking 5-37, despite serving up a number of boundary balls and being the chief contributor to the tally of 25 wides. Evetts starred behind the stumps (well he kept for the first half of the innings; saying he starred would be stretching things a bit - a bit like cla...

  OSCC, 167-5, lost to Old Cholmelians, 219-7, by 52 runs "I feel good. I reckon we're going to roll them for 60. 70 tops." It's fair to say that Josh Hook's assessment of Offley's prospects shortly before the game got underway proved to be a shade optimistic.  On a day when nothing went right once Josh Scott won the toss and decided to bowl, Offley produced one of their all-time dud performances to slump to a convincing defeat against the bottom side who had previously lost all four matches and passed 120 just once in four attempts including efforts of 85 and 69 all out. That they passed 120 without losing a wicket on Saturday says it all. That they had about seven different players for this one and spent much of the pre-match buildup introducing themselves to one another perhaps says something else. Captain Scott won the toss and elected to bowl, apparently convinced it was some sort of vicious minefield. In the wake of what was to follow it's fair to sa...