Royal Thomian revisited
The Royal – Thomian is primarily about boys (including those disguised as older and wiser men). The general melee of a Royal – Thomian in our day would guarantee two things. More booze. More chaos. More riotous dancing. And then more booze. So I lied, that’s more than two – but in those days, we never kept count of anything during the Big Match. With fists flying at no one and everyone, the pitch was not the only place to crack balls. There were fights over girlfriends. There were fights over the last dregs of coconut nectar. There were fights over lyrics, deemed heretical by those who sang no better and on no less heretical topics. There were, however, never fights over religion or ethnicity. These mattered little, and the only boundaries that matters were those that raised the score. And while there were fights over territory, these were not linked to traditional homelands.
Read A Royal Thomian family for the full article. This year, Royal batting proved as virile as the Queen Mother. The scoreboard at the time of writing:
09.45am – Toss won by S.Thomas’ College and STC elected to field
10.00am – Match Started
10.**am – Royal’s first wicket taken
10.**am – Royal’s second wicket taken
11.31am – Royal’s third wicket taken
11.39am – Royal’s fourth wicket taken
11.46am – Royal’s fifth wicket taken
12.15pm – Match stopped for lunch
01.00pm – Match resumed
01.44pm – Royal’s sixth wicket taken
02.01pm – Royal’s seventh wicket taken
Thora!
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Errrh.. A scoreboard without a score?
But 297/9 @ days end isnt bad @ all, thanks to Fernando’s century
True – too bad about the bloody rain.
2pm to 6pm – thora fire fizzles out and royal make 300!
What Royal-Thomian! Defensive/Negative Play Kills Excitement
When Royal were at 67 for 5 I’m sure the Royalists had a feeling that the Thomians were the better side. From this point onwards playing defensive to push for a draw would have set in, and that’s what directed the course of play for the rest of the first day, sadly.
From that precarious point onwards Royal recoverd through a 79 run partnership and were 146 for 6. Royal also had other good partnerships for the eigth and nineth wickets. Royal should have taken advantage of this and declared early, maybe around the 270′s or 10 overs before the end. Instead they ploddered on till the close of play to post 300 for 9, which sadly killed the excitement of the match. If Royal had declared 10 overs before the end, they could have taken advantage of Thomian fatigue,having bowled and fielded for most part of the day, to take some quick wickets which would have forced the Thomians to send in a nightwatchman to stem the tide. This would have put the match in a more positive and interesting position than what it is now. We also must take into account the rain factor, which interrupted play for a little on the first day, all the more reason to declare early to keep the match in a positive light. So Royal should have been more positive in its approach after it started to do well during the latter part of the day.
On the second day of course Royal had the upper hand but the Thomians, thanks to a strong partnership towards the end, were at 181 for 9 when rain finished off the day’s play. So the chances for an exciting and interesting match have been diminished due to negative play by the Royalists. The Roy-Tho needs to be more positive, like in the so called good old days, when even though it was a two day match there were more results.
In 2006 the Thomians declared early, without plodding on, at 278 for 8, which helped to push for a very interesting and close result, even though the result in the end went against the Thomians.
Well done Thora for being positive.