A s per usual, Trinity term plays host to Cricket Cuppers, the pinnacle of college cricket at Oxford. This year 29 colleges are vying for the chance to play at Uni Parks in the final, when hopefully the weather will remember that this is Trinity, and is therefore not meant to rain every day. The road to cricketing glory this year (at least for St Catherine’s and St Hugh’s) began with a wet, muddy bowl-out, in which a traffic cone was very nearly used for the wicket. Perhaps not the ideal first step.
This was a scene roughly repeated across Oxford, as few teams were able to play games on the often waterlogged pitches. The idiosyncrasies of the OUCC Cuppers rules means cuppers games are scheduled for a Monday, with the reserve day, should the game need to be cancelled for bad weather, being Thursday. If this slot is missed, as has been fairly common this year for obvious reasons, then a bowl-out ensues. This involves the stumps being placed at one end of the nets (the pitches were too wet for even this curtailed version of the game) and a set number of bowlers trying to hit them, whilst the team’s batsmen watch on helpless.
The reigning champions, Worcester, failed to meet this somewhat unusual challenge as St Catz won their second bowl-out in two weeks to progress to the quarter finals without yet playing a match. Balliol, Brasenose, Trinity, Keble and last year’s runners up, New/St. Hilda’s have also all progressed into the quarter finals, while there is a degree of disarray in some sections of the draw, with first round ties yet to be decided.
Whilst the journey to Uni Parks so far has been bizarre and enjoyable as a result, all those involved in college cricket will be desperate for the weather to continue its erratic, but discernible, upward trend towards some sun. If it doesn’t then you have to wonder how many people will turn up for a bowl-out to decide the final in 6th week. The most that can be said is that at least it’s more spectator-friendly than a coin toss.
