Queries Win by the Skin of their Teeth

There’s cricket, and then there’s Cricket, and then there’s the Queries versus The Frogs!

This fixture goes back a long way: we love it: we meet our friends year on year: we have good games. Today was no exception.

Not that it felt like that at the start. Queries won the toss and would bat. At 1/1, then 13/2, then 13/3, then 30/4 – and we had only been playing 60 mins – we wondered about that decision. Then Jack. Bramwell was out, caught to a brilliant slip catch. Jack Ralph followed him, clean bowled “teeing off”. And then James Brewer was out c&b and we had not even got to lunch! 71 for 7. Ye gods, what was happening?

However Josh Kelly, batting at 3 and for whom this match is something of a favourite event (he scored a half century last year and took 3 wickets), was still there and with Simon Campbell he set about the bowling. A superb stand of 100 followed before Josh was judged lbw for a brilliant 90. We were 170 for 8 and things looked a little more acceptable. Simon was then out caught for a hard-hit 50, Rupert Bagnall chipped in with 16 from just 4 shots, and the Queries declared at 198 for 9 after 52 overs.

Could we defend it? At 0/1 we had made a good start as Jack Bramwell took a sharp catch behind. The next 4 wickets fell within 10 runs, caught, stumped, lbw and bowled and Frogs were wobbling at 74 for 5. They breathed sighs of relief for 20 runs until Jack Bramwell took another catch. 98 for 6. James Melhorn took the gloves when Jack B was injured, and he (James) took two catches in two balls from the bowling of Tom Campbell. 126 for 8.

The Frogs were now playing out their final 20 overs: the crowd was getting tense. Rupert Bagnall was now bowling and number 9 hoicked it high and proud only for Tom Campbell to take a good catch. 9 down for 161. Could we do it?

There were 7 overs left, and the Frogs needed 38 to win. They inched closer and closer. Nails were being bitten. Tension was in the air. And then Jack Ralph achieved the run out of his life, hurling the ball at the stumps from a near-prone position, and it was all over. Queries had won by 2 runs, and the Frogs were all out for 196.

Huge sighs of relief! Great joy for the fielding side, and huge thanks from everyone around the ground for an excellent and exciting game of cricket, the final one of 2022 for the Queries.

Massive thanks to The Frogs for the match and best wishes for the remainder of their tour. Big thanks to umpires Mark Williams and Kannan Jagannathan and scorer Jakki Knight, to groundsman John Law and to ForkingOut for their excellent catering.

The numbers for our batters are not great – just 2 of them, Josh Kelly a superb 90 (110 balls, 137 mins, 6 fours and one 6) and Simon Campbell 50. You can find all the numbers on the score sheet at

What a brilliant day’s cricket to end our season on.