Tonge turn tables on the champions WHEN Jimmy Greaves used to talk about 'a funny old game', he was of course describing football but I happen to know that he was also a cricketer of no mean ability -- he once caught me behind the wicket!

I know, too, that he would agree that, at times, cricket can be a funnier old game than most others.

You expect a walkover -- you get a close finish. You expect a close finish -- you get a walkover.

It's called the 'glorious uncertainty' of cricket and on Saturday at Springfield Road we had a prime example.

Kearsley, recently and justifiably crowned champions, versus Tonge, title-holders for the last four seasons.

A kind of champion of champions situation which should, according to all known precepts, have been a tightly fought contest, probably decided in the final over by a wicket, a straight six, a superb catch or a hastily-run single. And what did we get? Well, in the end we got as one-sided a match as you could wish to see!

Simon Anderton won the toss and on the basis that Tonge have not chased particularly well in the latter half of the season, decided to bat first.

It proved eventually to be a wise decision, although at five for two, and 40 for four, the captain must have been starting to have his doubts.

Kearsley's deputy pro for the day was 18 year-old Janisor Khan, a team-mate of Fazal's in Pakistan, who has played this season in the Cambridge area and he wasted no time in disposing of young Andrew Kerr, bowling him with the total on two.

Kerr has enjoyed an excellent junior season at both club and representative level but on Saturday he was undone by sheer pace.

Hallows quickly followed at the other end, lbw to Mel Whittle and when Anderton and Northrop had joined them in the pavilion, Kearsley were on top for the first, and, as it turned out, only time.

Danny Rees stuck around for a while, playing some pleasant shots and David Celep looked to be heading for a big score until he found himself on the wrong end of a leg-before decision.

Iqbal Sikander settled down and in partnership first with Khurshid, and then with Waller, he stayed until the score was almost doubled.

In the process he played the shot of the day off Khan, sending the ball screaming along the turf between cover and mid-off.

His was the last wicket to fall when his shot-selection left a lot to be desired and he was bowled by a persevering Mel Whittle. Waller and Shepley, however, added an exhilarating 34 in the final five overs, which included two Shepley sixes and two dropped catches, all off the now understandably and thoroughly exasperated Whittle.

The score of 180 for eight was a far cry from 75 for five, and all credit to the Tonge middle and late order for having given Taylor and Sikander something at which to bowl.

If Kearsley had become just a little bit dispirited, then within 28 balls of the re-start they must have become positively suicidal. Three runs had been scored. Ratledge, Swift, Tom Whittle and Khan had departed and with them their side's hopes!

At 17, Celep took his third catch to get rid of Thomson, and when Chris Monks became Northrop's second victim at 30 for six, any casual observer could have been excused for assuming that it was the fielding side which had just clinched the League title.

Darron Foy, who, you will remember, had come in with the score on three for four, was looking relatively unperturbed and now, along with his wicket-keeper, he took the total up to 57.

When he was finally dismissed at 72 for eight he had contributed 34, almost half the team's runs, having hit four fours and a six along the way.

Tonge's only real worry came in the shape of the odd spot or two of rain and the light, either of which might have come to the aid of Kearsley, although not soon enough to save their self-respect on the day.

In the event Sikander, already with three wickets to his credit, quickly mopped up the last three at the end.

He finished with six for 34 from his 19 overs, fairly normal figures from a fairly abnormal bowler, while at the other end Ian Taylor acted out the straight man role for the umpteenth time, taking the other four wickets for 41.

With one match remaining, it's quite possible that the deadly duo will end their productive partnership by going one better than last season, when they combined to take 199.

By Saturday night Iqbal had taken 797 wickets in his seven years at Tonge, Taylor 373 in five.

In the five seasons during which they have shared the Castle Hill attack, they have averaged -- averaged mind you, 186 wickets per season.

I make no apology for harping on about the pair because, put quite simply, the Bolton League has never, before in it's 71-year history, seen their like, and now, sadly, it has come to an end, a fact that will cause very few tears at the other 13 clubs!

As for Kearsley, on the other hand, however badly they may have played on Saturday, in 2000 they have touched the heights.

They are the champions and, as Mel Whittle put it so graphically in a slightly different context the other week, them as wins can laugh, and them as loses can please themselves.

And he, along with all the rest of Simon Thomson's side, are the ones who will be laughing through the long winter until next April, when it all begins again!