Dubai: There were days when runs in Test cricket had to be earned really hard. Patience was a virtue. The more time a batter spent in the middle, the greater success he achieved.
But the advent of ODIs and then T20s slowly changed the way Test cricket was played and it became fast-paced and more result oriented. England even called it the Bazball style. The pressure to keep the crowd interested in the long format called for this change.
But in a bizarre match on Saturday in England of all places, a batter didn’t take any of this into consideration and faced a whopping 137 deliveries and scored nothing.
Opener Ian Bestwick in the company of his son, Thomas, played out 208 balls for just four runs in a Division Nine Derbyshire Cricket League match between Darley Abbey Cricket Club’s 4th XI and Mickleover 3rd XI.
Mickleover 3rd XI declared at 271 for four in 35 overs with their opener Max Thompson smashing a brilliant 186 off just 128 balls that included 17 boundaries and 14 sixes.
Contrasting innings
In complete contrast, the chase of Darley Abbey Cricket Club’s 4th XI was unbearably drab with the team scoring just 21 runs for the loss of four wickets in 45 overs.
Only two of the six Darley batters got off the mark, but none of them went past double figures. The nine extras was the highest scorer.
The team lost three quick wickets and were tottering at 8 for 3 before it became 19 for four.
It was then that the father-son duo of Ian Bestwick and Thomas Bestwick took charge in the middle. While Ian went run-less all through his innings, his son played out 71 balls for just four, which was a boundary.
“We had quite a young, inexperienced team ... let’s just see if we can protect our wickets,” a BBC report quoted Ian as saying after the match.
The match ended in a draw, but Mickleover 3rd XI got more points due to game rules. Both of them, however, are languishing at the bottom half of the points table.
“It’s gone round the world,” the 48-year-old Ian Bestwick told BBC Radio Derby after the match. “It has been mentioned in Australia, Pakistan, Qatar. I have had friend requests from around the globe.”
Ian said the draw felt as good as winning a trophy. “Our dressing room was bouncing. [The players] were all grinning, and thought it was brilliant. It shows you how good local cricket can be. We had been in the field for three hours chasing leather all over the place. They came off and were dejected, [but] at the end it was like we had won a cup or something. The atmosphere in our dressing room was second to none. It was brilliant. Towards the end, it became a thing where I was determined not to score.”
