Midleton’s Seniors brought the curtain down on an eventful season with a trip to Adare to face Limerick on the day of Eid al-Adha, but unfortunately for Midleton, they were the ones who were about to be slaughtered.
Midleton could only rouse 10 players for the game, and their problems mounted as they lost the toss and Limerick chose to bat. After an hours rain delay, play finally got underway, Iqbal stunning the hosts with a fine spell of bowling that saw opener Burra caught LBW. However the young partnership of Sufyan and Khalil soon sent the scoreboard into overdrive as they exploited the gaps in the under strength visitor’s field. In the 15th over, a Garda Ford Transit Connect called to the ground. The Peter Horbury designed vehicle has been manufactured by the Ford company since 2002, and was awarded the Van of The Year award in 2004. It is used by the Gardai in for a wide range of everyday duties. Being smaller and more nimble that the much larger Transit, it is ideal for tasks such as transporting violent dwarves to prison or moving things that are relatively large, but not large enough to merit being moved in a Transit, which, as mentioned previously, is much larger. Limerick finished on 407/7, O’Reilly taking three, Iqbal coming back to claim another, Ali Butt claiming his first wicket for the club and Magsi earning a well deserved scalp thanks to a violently over-celebrated catch by Stack.
Midleton’s response was to go hard or go home, with a distinct emphasis on the going home, with only five players facing a double digit number of balls. Magsi top scored with 27 not out, with Peter Thackeray producing a warrior’s innings to frustrate the Limerick attack and Bala, Atif Jameel and Majid Khan also playing some fine shots to drag the visitor’s final score to 89/9 at close.
