Sunday 7th June 2026
Ripley 117 all out (31.1 overs)
SCCC 116-9 (35 overs)
Ripley won by one run
35 over match
Ripley won the toss
Scorecard
Dom Wood writes:
There are 300 Spartans in the legend, and there is one David Grindrod in the Cryptics. As Ed led the men in pink onto a Ripley outfield that had all the warmth and welcome of a Thermopylae morning – grey, cold, and faintly threatening – the numbers were not lost on those who knew. One wicket stood between Daddy Grinders and Cryptics immortality. Paul Goss, who had spent the week at Lord’s enjoying the Test match hospitality with rather more enthusiasm than the occasion strictly demanded, arrived at the ground and announced he would be standing in the middle. This was understood by all to be a tactical appointment: a man determined to thwart a milestone by parking himself at one end with a dull finger and an entirely clear conscience. The plan was elegant. It did not survive contact with David Grindrod.
The wicket was a proper green top, not unlike the Lord’s surface that had served up carnage for New Zealand and England alike this week. Ripley’s strip wore its intentions openly: it was going to do something, the only question being to whom. Grindrod, unbothered by Goss’s strategic umpiring, shaped up, released a daisy cutter of spiteful precision, and detonated the Ripley opener’s stumps first ball. Three hundred wickets. The field erupted. Goss, to his eternal credit, managed to resist the urge to call a no-ball, though those closest to him report a visible internal struggle. King Leonidas had taken his Hot Gates moment and would not be denied.
Paul Bridges bowled handsomely in his opening spell, beating the bat with pleasing regularity, though on this surface pleasing regularity occasionally meant the ball missed everything it intended to hit and a good deal it didn’t. Rory Goss entered the attack and, in a development that briefly suspended the cricket entirely, managed to dislocate Andy Rayner’s finger behind the stumps. The effect on the field was immediate. All ten remaining Cryptics relocated to the furthest available positions, united in the view that whatever was happening near the stumps was not something they needed a closer look at. Dom, stepped into the breach and pulled on the gloves whereupon a thick edge flew to hand, fourteen men were certain of a wicket, and the Ripley batsman stood his ground with the serenity of a man who had not nicked it and did not intend to say otherwise. Goss, at the other end, found no reason to intervene. The universe, however, has a longer memory. Although the very next ball disappeared to the boundary and was immediately petitioned as leg byes from the behind the stumps, and the batsman was bowled shortly afterwards. Karma, as ever, keeps impeccable records.
Rory picked up another caught behind, this time the batsman walked without a murmur, restoring one’s faith in the spirit of cricket entirely. Pranay was then handed the ball and proceeded to bowl with real flight and guile, the kind that makes batsmen feel they are being asked a question in a language they half-recognise. Three wickets followed, the pick of them a catch from Rory Goss running back, over the shoulder, with the certainty of a man who had watched the Ben Stokes’ 2019 World Cup catch vs South Africa. Emmanuel College will be pleased with the collaborative effort. Jim and Archie applied themselves with variable line and length that kept everyone – batsmen included – in a state of productive uncertainty, and were rewarded with a wicket apiece. Ripley were dispatched for 117 in around 32 overs.
Tea was, once again, excellent. The Cryptics have enjoyed a remarkable run of them this season, and one begins to wonder if this is the real source of the unbeaten record.
Dom strode out with Arjun requiring less than four an over. What could go wrong?
In the 4th over, Dom attempted to hoick the crafty Ripley spinner to midwicket and was bowled. Keith looked composed and purposeful for precisely long enough to suggest he had read the conditions correctly before edging behind for four and walking off before Goss could raise a finger. As Keith departed, the Cryptics were treated to what may be a club first: the now fielding Ripley number four bat received a send-off from the departing Keith: “That’s how you walk, sir.”
Arjun and Ed put together a steadying twenty, and even after Arjun’s departure for a gritty 21 the target looked eminently manageable. But the green top (did we mention the wicket was bowler friendly?) continued to provide assistance to the Ripley bowlers. Andy successfully overcame an internal moral battle to resist depositing the slow bowling into the Thames, but this was a decision that seemed to resolve itself through compromise: he chopped on. Both junior Grindrods picked out midwicket with a synchronisation. Pranay attempted to use his feet, found the pitch unsympathetic to the idea, and was bowled.
The metronomic regularity of falling wickets left twenty required off four overs. Daddy Grinders and Rory Goss at the crease. The hutch, noting that both men had already hit winning runs this season, was cautiously optimistic. Rory ran with his customary lung-bursting commitment, including a dive to keep himself in. Six needed off the final over. This was a bridge, just slightly too far. The Cryptics came second by a single run.
But, there were consolations in the bar afterwards: Daddy Grinders with the 300 wickets milestone. Eddy Grinders passed 1,000 runs. Two jugs were procured and dispatched with appropriate ceremony.
With insufficient volunteers prepared to make the trek to Havant, the men in pink stand down until late June, when an as-yet-unspecified opposition will be invited to try their luck. In the meantime, there is a New Zealand series and the memory of a very good game to be getting on with.
Milestones for two Grindrods