More runs through the leg side for David Westcott, and all with a borrowed bat

Westcott left Cranleigh in 1975 and after a stint at Oxford where he earned a law degree and a hockey Blue, he returned to Cranleigh to teach in 1970-80 while he prepared for the 1980 Moscow Olympics. Britain's political boycott of those games meant he missed out but after a post-graduate year back in Oxford he spent the summer preparing for the World Cup late in 1981. Westcott, who had a reputation as a hitter with a remarkable eye while at school, had made his OC debut against Merrow in 1980, scoring 27. But with time on his hands, he was around for all five week-day matches in 1981.

On the Monday we entertained Kent Babes, who we had tied with 12 months earlier, and in overcast conditions, Peter Shelley won the toss and batted. Iain Wilkie, still at Exeter University, opened the innings with Nick Priestnall, who had just left the Common Room. We made a Wilkiesque start, the first six overs producing four singles, all to Wilkie as he milked the strike. Plus ca change. Off the first ball of the seventh over Priestnall was caught behind for 0.

Westcott came in shortly after midday and made a circumspect start. After an hour we were 30 for 1. Wilkie then fell lbw for a painstaking 14, and shortly before the break, the outgoing school captain Andy Staples spooned a return catch for 21 off the ninth ball of a wayward over. Westcott was 37 in 82 minutes at lunch.

When play resumed, Westcott opened up. He went from fifty, reached in a relatively pedestrian 96 minutes, to his hundred in 36 minutes, giving his only two chances while in the sixties, both to Warrington, the Babes' opening bowling, and both in the same over. With Simon Ward he added 128 for the fourth wicket, Ward's share 35. As the bowling flagged and the field dispersed, Westcott used the spaces to good effect, content to run ones and twos.

In the penultimate over of the innings, Andy Ellison, clobbered for 11, produced a handkerchief and waved a surrender. Shelley finally called off the slaughter with the OCs on 239 for 4 and Westcott unbeaten on 149. He had batted for 173 minutes and hit 13 fours and 11 threes. His last hundred had taken 77 minutes but his day was far from over

The Babes made a wobbly start, slipping to 51 for 3, before Ellison and Mills took them to 146 for 3, and they started the last 20 overs needing 94 with wickets in hand. Two overs earlier, Shelley had tossed the ball to Westcott, an occasional offspinner and the seventh bowler tried. Few would claim Shelley was an OC Mike Brearley, but the gamble was inspirational.

With the first delivery of his third over, Westcott had Mills lbw for 45, and after successive maidens, a youthful Mike Chewtode, bowling down the hill off a long run, had Coles caught by Shelley. Westcott then broke the back of the innings, Ellison chipping to Wilkie at mid-off for 66 and then Derosa swiping and missing to be leg-before off the next ball.

Coombes briefly got after Chetwode, who was replaced by Staples as the score climbed, but Westcott was treated with increasing respect. Arnold, the No. 9, looped a return catch to him and then, not to be kept out of the action, Westcott pounced after a leg-side edge off Staples had hit Shelley on the shoulder and lobbed up; as Shelley prepared to catch the rebound Westcott nipped across from slip and took it out of his gloves.

It was all done and dusted an over later as Westcott completed his five-for, finishing with career-best figures of 9.1-1-33-5 as we won by 40 runs with five overs in hand. It was the most remarkable all-round performance it the club's history.

"The truth is, it was just my lucky day," Westcott admitted. "Everything fell into place and I rode my luck, and even my bowling paid off … at the time that certainly seemed the more surprising event. Might I have thought it possible to score 149 ? I suppose I would have done. Could I have contemplated getting five wickets ? Never!"

As usual, the last word goes to Chetwode. "Westcott borrowed my bat ... a clubbingly heavy SS Jumbo. It never made more runs in one innings. Indeed, I doubt it doubled the total in its entire life!"