MONTHLY ROUND-UP: MAY 1867
We reach the end of May with The Regent’s Park and Angel Islington tied at the top of the Metropolitan League standings on seven wins and two defeats each, although champions the Old Westminsters are finding their form and are not too far behind. The Regent’s had taken the outright lead with a win over Angel, and indeed they won all three games they played in May, but the postponement of their visit to Kensington on the last weekend of the month allowed Angel to catch up when a late turnaround took them past the City of London Club 3-2.
The Westminsters started the month by falling to defeat against Angel, a result which left them looking quite a distance behind already, but they responded by winning the next three games and now sit on six wins and four defeats. The Westminsters play the Regents and Angel in their next two games, giving them further chance to gain ground. Kensington are in fourth place having played only twice this month due to postponements, while the City of London Club’s encouraging start is fading as they were beaten in all three of their games. Also without a win in May were Clapham, who have now lost eight of their nine games this year.
A remarkable story this month was the two lengthy games which we saw in successive weekends, taking twenty-one innings each to find a winner. First it was The Regent’s Park and Clapham who did battle, the game lengthened even more by a delay for rain before the Regents took it 4-3 as darkness began to fall. With people thinking it would be many years before such a long game took place again, the very next week the Old Westminsters tied their game with Kensington at 3-3 in the ninth and the teams battled on for twelve more innings before the game again finished 4-3, in the Westminsters’ favour.
