Date: Sunday, November 18, 2025
Location: Walhalla Oval, Walhalla, Victoria
Time: 10.30 a.m. start
Captain: Rev
Another tour game gone, another loss. That, however, is about the only downside to game against Blackbridge CC.
A startlingly beautiful location, a fun opposition and some great times made this into a tour game to remember and a good reminder of why we do it.
As is the way with all tour games, some of the squad arrived very early (Ed, F1, Gelder, Dusty), some arrived the day before (Maxy, Fargo, TBC, Rev), some arrived on the day (Animal, Radar) and some didn’t arrive at all (Daisy).
Well done to Radar and Animal for doing the round trip in a day to help make this happen.
Well done to Slug for also making it for the day & recording all the action for us. Legend.
For those of us that did get there a bit early, we were able to take in the wonders of this little town in the mountains, it’s running streams and imposing trees, as well as 19th century architecture. Charming.
Added to this was its slight eccentricities; lonesome individuals playing the banjo by the river at night, mysterious men in full kilt distributing DVDs by the boxful, and random crowds in ye olde dress just milling about.
Aside from taking in the charm the town had to offer, we made some of our own. F1 made the genius move to bring his retro SNES system, allowing us to see Dusty dominate and take 8/8 in Super International Cricket.
Unfortunately it wasn’t to be replicated on the field…
…With the weather hovering between ‘awful’ and ‘shithouse’, the change was made to meet at the bottom of the mountain that the ground lies on top of at 9:30 on Sunday morning and start as soon as possible.
Plans were made, roughly agreed to and soon we started climbing the mountain in dribs and drabs. To say the climb was tricky would be something of an understatement, though we had the drone of Maxy’s whingeing to cheer us as we went. Fargo seemed disturbingly in his element, pushing up through it like a Kokoda veteran.
| Blackbridge CC in the carpark far below | Maxy schlepping the kit bag on the 20m up-hill hike |
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The rain and hail started and stopped during the trek, to be expected while walking through clouds, and a sign of things to come.
The ground at the top has been saved and rehabilitated by locals and they have produced quite the result. It is completely girt by trees, resulting in every crack of the ball on the bat giving off a resonating ‘crack!’. A wondrous place.
On top of this, a portable kitchen was established, selling bacon and egg rolls, beers, ciders and barbecued snags so good that Maxy was hassling me to go back for 3rds. Genuine thanks to the organising staff.
Blackbridge turned out impressively in matching blazers and caps, which we contrasted to in our melange of uniforms. If the teams had anthems theirs would have a wood section and ours may have resembled Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins.
For one of the only times in Quokka history, a coin was tossed and, rightly, we lost. We were sent in to bat anyway, probably (another) generosity from our hosts.
With time a pressing concern, the game was shortened to a T20 with a generous sprinkling of YPCA (no LBW, retire at 30, no short stuff etc) and local (no 6s) rules.
F1 and Radar opened things up against what were a couple of genuinely quick bowlers. Thankfully the rain meant that the pitch was slow and anything short of a length sat up to be nudged square for a boundary. Both Radar and F1 made the ‘mistake’ of hitting a 6, each of which was met with a chorus of “Boos” and simply recorded as a deal ball.
They both went on to retire not out and the Quokkas seemed on top on the mountain for more than one reason. We were 0/81 after ten overs and seemingly cruising.
Our friends at Blackbridge had other ideas though, and brought on their slower bowlers, which changed the game completely.
After summoning the ANZAC spirit, Fargo was hitting out powerfully, but this brought his undoing as he was well caught in the deep. Ed came on and started building a picket fence, before retiring to give others a go in what must have been his selfless act for the day.
Dusty had a touch of the Fargos, hitting out powerfully before popping a return catch to the spinner.
Maxy, who had been asleep as square leg umpire at a vital time, came on and started nudging singles about. TBC at the other end reminded us why he was better up the order against straight & quick bowling and was soon castled.
Maxy looking the goods
Gelder then came on and also struggled with the conditions and ran himself out going for a desperate slide, arse-first. 360 degree cricket indeed.
Animal came on with not many to go and brought his two main playing cards: nudging singles and running out his partner. Welcome to the Quokkas, Maxy.
That left myself to play the last ball of the innings, which was so slow and loopy I almost had a conniption wondering how to play it. In the end I settled on a reverse sweep for 1 and we were all back out on the field in no time to keep things moving ahead of the rain.
Reverse sweep, almost with photo evidence
119 was the total, just under a run-a-ball on a tricky pitch. Dare we dream?
Learning from the opposition, I got TBC to open the bowling and he was (as usual) very, very tight with excellent lines and lengths. I brought myself on to try and emulate his slow-bowling craftiness, which worked for me about as often as it didn’t. Hats off to TBC.
Everyone was brought on for 2 over spells, all of which seemed economical but the wickets weren’t coming. The occasional boundary was though, which was a worry. The other thing that started coming was the rain, very enthusiastically.
Paul, our extremely generous and accommodating umpire for the whole game sent us all off when it started getting really heavy and we spent a good 20 minutes marvelling at Gelders enjoyment of standing in the hail. Spot the Scotsman, if you will.
Can’t keep a good man down
Eventually it cleared up and we got back out there with the pitch well and truly drenched by this point. The outfield, being mostly moss on clay, had gone from being slippery to a water park ride. This made fielding somewhat hazardous for everyone apart from Gelder who seemed to be at one with the earth.
Their batters continued to retire as our bowlers continued without much luck. With not many overs to go, I thought the game was nearly over.
Then, against the tide of play and water, Dusty summoned some SNES experience and bowled a straight one that slid under the bat for our first wicket.
This inspired a late run of wickets, with F1 (bowling leggies!) and then myself also getting in the wickets with straight deliveries that stayed lower than Flo Rida.
With 2 overs to go, things had gone from chilly to spicy and so I turned back to Dusty to repeat his technical prowess but it wasn’t to be.
Slips at the ready for TBC
The only slips in the scorebook were TBC going arse over tit twice in the field
Many thanks to Blackbridge for the great game, to Walhalla CC for putting on the spread and being such great hosts. Massive thanks to all the Blackbridge players who helped us make up numbers in the field, not least Scotty who we absolutely welcome into the fold.
