2019 - Prague, CZ
The joy of touring Prague, for what…?
For a person as cynical (one of the many cons of being a researcher) as me (Benan), there are two things that brings joy (without any questions asked). 1. The beginning of a premier league season, 2. The beginning of our cricket season. Come April, the sparse cricket enthusiasts in Norway look forward to brighter sunny days, after being in dark for much of the preceding 6 months. The season gone-by has become a distant memory. I may have averaged 1.89 last season but that hasn’t stopped me from splashing cash on new cricket gears, the logic pretty straightforward - Dre Russ uses this bat, must be good. As is the norm at Aliens CC, a pre-season tour during the month of April, Prague was set as the destination this year.
Cricket is probably the last thing Prague is known for. Situated on the Vitava river, it is more famous for its varied beers. Who am I to talk on beers, I stop it there by just saying that Prague is the home of Pilsner and that each Pragueite consumes roughly 155 litres of beer a year! Trust me, I had no clue what Pilsner was, up until I reached Oslo way back in 2013 The only beer known to me was kingfisher premium and kingfisher strong. Coming back to the topic that I am supposed to write, our first evening at Prague wasn’t much of a scene. We were all waiting for the real action next day or were we?
First beers in Prague
Sampling Bohemia’s finest, on a Boat!
The Norwegian weather followed us to Prague. It was cold and overcast but we were keen for the task ahead. We were joined by our lifetime member Vijai Prabhudass who travelled all the way from Florida to play cricket in Prague, seriously? What are the chances of that happening again? Jokes aside, we appreciate both Vijai and Christopher’s brother Jarred (who travelled from UK) to be able to make it and I guess Jarred made the most of his time in Prague ;). Christopher volunteered to lead the side for the three games.
Long time member Vijai travelled all the way from Texas to join us in Prague.
Despite a broken finger (AFL injury) and a forgotten passport casting doubts over his participation, Jarred made the most of his time in Prague.
We travelled from our hotel to the ground in not-so-high spirits for our first game of the tour. Reason being: it was crazy cold (probably around 7-10oC) and highly likely to rain. We chose a weekend, that was sandwiched in between two 22 – 25oc weeks. That’s how lucky we were. The home team won the toss and chose to bat. Damon started the proceedings and soon struck. The skipper had to take his strike bowler off soon, recognizing the fact that this could all end pretty soon, and gave the ball to me for my slow seam-ups. Vijai, who shared the new ball with Damon at the other end, struggled to get his line right and was replaced by the other Trinidadian. I was lucky to get a few wickets upfront and was agonizingly short of my first fifer. The 5th wicket refusing to walk, thought there was a clear nick. See or hear for yourself
Peter and Kishore mopped up the tail and we were set a target of 104 to win. The Aliens chase began poorly as I was caught off a leading edge for a paltry 3. Dave indulged in some nice drives and soon the chase was on track. Giving Dave company was our skipper Chris who looked extremely assured at the crease. Dave was bowled off a full-toss for 31. Peter joined Chris and both off them took us close to the target. Peter looked classy and played a picture-perfect cover drive enroute his 25. Though both were dismissed off consecutive deliveries Branson and Sunil made sure there were no more casualities and took us home.
Peter in his bowling stride.
Refreshments
Peter and Branson ready to take on Vinohrady seamers
We did have a good time, didn’t we?
Sunday report.
For the Sunday game Aliens travelled out into the Czech country side to find the ground in the nice little village of Velvary. After a few wrong turns we eventually found the ground in time for the rain to start. Nobody was super enthusiastic so a wise call was made to retire to local pub to wait out the weather.
Typically good (and cheap) Czech beers washed the blues away. Online followers found much mirth in the curious decorations on the walls.
Damon’s reputation had proceeded us.
After a slight break in the rain and a fair bit of indecision we made it back to the ground and decided to try and play a t20 despite player comfort not being at an all time high.
Aliens bowled first on the newly laid and quite sandy pitch. Early on their openers kept out the Aliens bowlers but took a while to reallly get going. The first wicket falling for 12 runs courtesy of the bowling of Sudesh.
The light rain didn’t really ease up so for the remaining overs in the field the more fairweather fielders were regularly calling for our 12th player to field a few overs.
In the middle Vinohrady struggled to up the scoring rate have some trouble with the bounce of the new pitch. Wickets fell regularly with some decent catching by the Aliens fielders especially with the greasy ball, in particular the great grab by Sudesh in the deep removing the Vinohrady highest scorer Mukesh for 23. For the bowlers life member Vijai kept steaming in and was rewarding for bowling good line and length with tidy figures of 3 wickets for 9 off his 4 overs. Tour organiser Hinchy came in at the end to finish things off taking 2/15. 2 wickets to Shahabaz from his express pace spin, also wickets to Peter and Sudesh. The target to chase 105.
Aliens werent quite jumping out of their skins to open the bat, opting for warm and shelter instead. Damien and Vij eventually drew the short straw to lead the Aliens chase. Damien started slowly getting used to the pace of the pitch. Vij however out for one in the second over to give Vinohrady some early optimism. This wicket proved to be highlight however. From this point onwards neither side really played their best cricket. A few catches went down in the field as our opposition couldn’t quite cash in on several opportunities to make the chase difficult. Sunil had a bit of a Barry Crocker in the field “helping” the opposition out with an xtra fielder dropping a couple catches which didn’t get much sympathy from his friends on the sideline after his sledging from the shelter whilst we fielded. Despite his best efforts to get into shelter earlier Damien put on 50 not out. Shahabaz (33*) and Sudesh (9*) seeing us home in the 13th over. Much to the delight of everyone as it meant we could go get warm and dry.
Just as the game finished the sun came out… just in time for us to stop playing cricket. It did give us a glimpse of what things wouldve been like the previous or next weekend when the weather was over 20 degrees.
After a brief presentation to our wonderful hosts Vinohrady, where they earnt themselves a coveted Aliens cap. We returned to Prague keen to hit the town!
