We pulled up in the car at Tempe Park after an hour of driving. Empty ovals stretched as far as the eye could see and a howling wind was blowing bits of rubbish past in the late afternoon light.

“That can’t be them”, I said to Rebecca. A few minutes of silence passed as we stared out of the car window to distant cricket nets where four or five blokes were standing around in their whites, smoking and drinking beer ….I eventually spoke what we both knew but she did not have the heart to tell me. 

“That’s them”.

I put the car into gear and, after navigating around the plethora of soccer, rugby league and cricket pitches I did a slow reconnaissance drive-by of the nets, to be sure. A bloke was padded up and batting while the others lazily sent down deliveries. The batsman seemed to have an effective, if unorthodox style. 

I left Rebecca with a crossword in the car and walked over to the gathering which was the Apaches Cricket Club pre-winter season training session. “Are you the Apaches?” I asked the nearest punter. At the mere mention of the word his eyes lit up with distant hope and excitement...”yes mate, are you here for training?”

“Yep” I replied and without a further word I was tossed an old cricket ball, broken seams over well worn and scuffed leather – nothing more said, I knew what to do. I turned over a few, apparently quite dusty after years away from the sport. The first couple of deliveries went wide of the pitch, but the batsman was pretty forgiving, respectfully stepping across to put bat to ball. A couple of beers later, I had loosened up and was starting to get back into the rhythm. Then Webko, the bloke who had been batting to start with, came over and introduced himself. With a cigarette hanging out of the side of his mouth, he asked :

“You a bowler or batter mate?”

Being a few years out of the game I wasn’t sure - “not sure mate” to which he replied “So you’re an all-rounder then, mate”

“Well, I can’t really bat or bowl, so I guess that makes me an all-rounder”.

There was a glint in his eye, a subtle upward turn on the edge of his mouth that almost betrayed the hint of a smile...”Well you’ve come to the right place”. As I watched one of the team make an enthusiastic swing with the bat, failing to connect with a delivery while stumbling and nearly falling over, as someone lobbed a half full tinnie over to him, I realised Webko was right. I had come to the right place. From then on I would comfortably take my place alongside my newfound comrades in a plot that was somewhere between Crackerjack and Cool Runnings - down and out, unsung suburban heroes bathed generously in sporting mediocrity but with healthy, positive optimism that everything would be alright. There would always be another weekend; an after game drinks session with mates, and another chance to come good. We’d show ‘em next weekend....

Webko is the heart and soul of the Apaches Cricket Club. Webmaster, Coach, Club President, Equipment Officer, Transport Officer and Social Secretary in one. Not an easy task with 100+ club members – although I suspected that most members did not play but rather joined in for the legendary post match drinks sessions at the Sydney Park Hotel, the Club’s sponsor. Which is where you’ll also find Webko most nights of the week, fag in hand, VB and a crossword in front of the footy. Betting cards nearby (for the ‘hounds or the carts) and holding forth with the local riff-raff on any topic but with a preference for sport and politics. He has an enthusiastic appetite for robust debate, matched equally by his penchant for the drink and the smoke. A 1980’s beer commercial brought to life in the inner western suburbs of Sydney in 2010. A genuine, decent knockabout sort of bloke.

My first game with the Apaches was out at Liverpool on a Saturday morning, against the appropriately named “Liverpool Lions” (runners up in 2009 Division 7) - a mix of has-beens, coulda'-beens, never was or never should’ve-beens with a wicketkeeper who looked like he was barely 12 years old (turned out to be the son of the team captain). I noticed that their kit looked a lot better than ours.

It took me about two and a half hours to drive out to the oval. Being the last to arrive, I was put in to bat last. Unfortunately we only had seven players, which wasn’t too bad for a nine-a-side, 36 over game. We were 4/21 when I arrived at the game and 5-for not much more when I went in to bat. I put down 17 runs including one boundary, and when I was bowled out we were on 61. I would've picked up a second boundary but a sweep shot that was destined for four stopped dead in the suspiciously long grass immediately in front of the boundary leaving us to run out three hard earned runs.

A few tinnies were downed and cigarettes smoked before we ambled out onto the field to defend our modest total. Webko opened the bowling.

Webko’s bowling style is mesmerising. It is off a short run-up, but he quickly gets up to pace, with arms flying everywhere so you lose sight of the ball in amongst flailing limbs until it emerges at some point with deadly accuracy and surprising speed. Swinging aggressively and then tearing away off the pitch with ferocity. No two balls the same. The type of unpredictable bowling that puts fear into the hearts of even experienced batsmen.

We had a couple of breakthroughs early that definitely put wind in our sails. Morale began to lift and we felt that something could be on. Webko knew I wanted to bowl but we didn’t have a lot of runs to defend and I was an unknown quantity out in the middle. Finally Webko called me over “OK youth, now’s your chance, do us proud”. My first few balls were conservative. I was bowling slow-medium just outside off-stump, trying to keep down the runs, minimising damage. It wasn’t until the second last ball of the over that I started to relax and felt I could open it up a bit. I added a few extra steps to my run-up, came in at speed and put it down hard... perhaps in my enthusiasm I over-reached... I lost a bit of control and the ball went wild – an overpitched full toss. I staggered awkwardly down the pitch in follow through, out of balance. I was headed face first onto the turf. 

The crack of the bat on ball went off like a gunshot. I was desperately trying to stay on my feet, and failing. I was on the way down, arms beating in the air like a windmill and legs splayed out like a cat as I tried to regain balance.

In perhaps my only display of skill for the day, at the very last second I put my hands out to protect my face from the red projectile that I realised was heading in my direction at Mach 3. The pain from the impact of the ball in the palm of my right hand was searing. It felt like my hand was smashed into pieces as I continued my multi-staged descent into the dirt. Yet miraculously the ball somehow stuck in my hand. As my face made contact with the turf I doggedly hung onto the thing as if my life depended on it.

I rolled around on the grass for a while in complete agony. I didn’t want to look at my hand but I assumed there would be bits and pieces of it all over the pitch. I hoped the rest of the team would help me pick up the digits - apparently of you keep them frozen and get to hospital quick smart the surgeons nowadays are quite good at re-attachment.

I quickly realised I had far greater concerns than my hand when the first body landed on me. Remembering an age-old adage – “when you score, catch, take a wicket, or win – get away from your team or you’ll get hurt”. Note that when a soccer player scores a goal they clear off, putting as much distance between themselves and their team as possible. I did not have the presence of mind or perhaps the luxury of making good my own escape. “No!!, My hand!!” I screamed as I tried to wrestle myself out of the deadly, sweaty and Winnie-blue smelling embrace I quickly found myself in. One by one they piled on top, each blow more crushing than the last. As if anyone needed any further encouragement, someone yelled out “STACKS ON!!!”- the weekend sporting warrior’s call to arms.

I knew he was out there, but I didn’t know how long it would take him to get in from the boundary. Every team has one – a big bloke called “Boof” – he drinks the most beer, sculled from a trophy if they ever won one, and at post match celebrations will always do something ridiculous or inappropriate, encouraged by howls of laughter and the loving admiration of his beer-soaked team mates. I figured I probably had a couple of minutes, the time it would take out Boof (luckily he has a limp to slow him down) to cover the hundred-odd metres from the boundary to the pitch. 

As my time drew long at the bottom of this sweating, heaving pyramid of man-love I became increasingly alarmed. He must be close by now, “Come on fellas, that’s enough…tha…” My words were cut short as all air was squeezed from my lungs and my back and nose simultaneously cracked. I think I was screaming through a mouthful of dirt, but all that came out was a pathetic wheeze that would have done Kerry O’Keefe proud.1 I’m not sure if I was crying, but I could have been. After Boof had completed the deadly coup de grace to his own satisfaction and that of the team’s, they all piled off. It took me a little while to move. They were oblivious to the lifeless, dusty and broken heap on the ground. I rolled to my feet and quickly assessed the situation to make sure there wasn’t an encore stacks-on in the making. If they decided to have another round I’d be ready.

I bowled out my overs in great pain, making sure to keep the ball away from the wicket in case I should unwittingly experience more success and provoke another “attack”. A catch was nearly taken but I willed it to be put down, and so it was.

We finished up losing by 3 wickets. Not so bad given they had nine players and we only had seven. We handed over our $5 each to the umpire and $20 to Webko for the match subs.

Later at the pub, beers were flowing freely and the talk was high. My back was still hurting but the beers started to dull the pain. Webko pulled me aside at the bar and said “you did well out there today mate – keen for next weekend?” In the background I could see Boof passed out in the beer garden and the rest of the team pouring beer over him, much to their own delight and the annoyance of the bar staff. I surveyed Webko, peering at me from over his schooner and slowly disappearing in cigarette smoke. Through the smoke I could make out his toothy grin, Boonie-style walrus moustache dripping with beer as outside the sun set over the inner western suburbs street, just starting to come to life as another Saturday night in Sydney rolled on. “Sure, mate, I’m in”

1 A notoriously breathy/wheezy-laughing cricket commentator on ABC Radio.

Cameron O’Neill works in banking in Sydney and writes for the Cud in his spare time.