In the opening scenes of the movie Gladiator, Commodus travels from Rome to join the campaign in Germania, "Have I missed the battle?" he asks, "You've missed the whole bloody war" his father replies. For Commodus read Fayyaz's's girlfriend, for Rome, Blackburn and for Germania, Wray Crescent. "Have I missed his first ball?" asked Fayyaz's girlfriend arriving four and a half minutes after the scheduled start of play, "You've missed his whole innings".

And so the Pacific campaign began in inauspicious circumstances. Tristan falling to a bowler born earlier that morning before Fayyaz's dismissal brought Dan "I've never scored a century" Humphrey to the crease. Watchful batting with first Toby then Ramiz steadied the ship. A score of 300 looked on until Ramiz played one big shot too many and departed for 32. 187 for 4 soon became 216 for 8 as the tail sagged rather than wagged. Mark cursed loudly after dragging a half volley onto his stumps while this author was beaten by an unplayable delivery past a textbook defence (the contrary evidence of TikTok, suggesting an eyes closed heave across the line, is a cautionary tale of manipulated videos on social media).

Manav strode out and duly shepherded Dan "I was running out of partners" Humphrey to his maiden Pacific century and his coronation, "All hail the King in the North". A few well placed edges from Manav and Tim set a just about competitive total of 250 from the full 40 overs.

Both of the watching spectators would have been impressed by the professionalism on show at tea as Riz put the troops through their paces with some high catches and fielding practice. The Actonian openers strode out purposefully and went about their business "like they were running out of time" (a Hamilton the musical reference - highly recommended for anyone needing to make up to their significant others for all the weekends spent standing around in fields).

With 60-odd on the board from 6 overs a high spiralling catch went up, up, up, the watching crowd held their breath, until it went down, down, down. Alas, the only player who hadn't got in any practice at tea was the drill sergeant running the session! The mistake was not to prove too costly as a couple of balls later the opener was out LBW - as he walked off he could be seen wiping plum sauce from the middle of his pad.

Captain Tim rotated the bowlers effectively with a wicket falling to Dan "I got my century" Humphrey at one end with Fayyaz unlucky not to bag one at the other. The fast scoring continued however until an Uber eats delivery arrived and the opener opted to retire himself.

Manav struck with his very first ball and continued to deceive the opposing batsmen as he picked up four wickets (it would have been five but Dan "I dropped a catch but I got a hundred" Humphrey dropped a catch, having earlier got a hundred) in a spell that saw him leap to the top of the Pacific wicket taking list.

Pacific employed a dual strategy in pursuit of an unlikely victory - rain and cheeseburgers. Unfortunately, even the Casio calculator on the scorers bench had Pacific lagging behind on D/L when the rain came - which itself wasn't strong enough to trouble die hard October cricketers. The cheeseburgers however went down a treat. The retired out batsman gorging himself as his team went down to the penultimate wicket.

There was action all over the field. Mystery balls spun back from Finsbury Park station, impossible catches were taken in the deep and an incessant barrage of good natured sledging from behind the stumps almost laughed several batsmen clean out. Captain Tim heroically fizzed in a spell at the death with eleven broken fingers but alas, it was all to no avail. The winning runs from the Actonians swatted away by a man wearing shoes bought that morning from Poundland. Actonians 253 for 7 with three overs remaining.