The 2nd XI found themselves travelling to Outwood for week 14 of the League season , one that we usually dread because of the waiting times at the airport for the internal flight...
Fortunatley there was only a small bit of bother in customs and we all managed to arrive on time for yet another game in the scorching heat , Even better was that Captain Pearce won the toss and elected to bat on what looked a good wicket [not that i know a thing about reading pitches but if its hot you know the rules!]
Pearce and Manks walked out to open and got us off to a good start with Paul taking a liking to their left armer up the hill punishing anything on his legs, with the skipper having a steadier start but then accelerating with some nice cover drives.
The pair made it to 89 before the skip snicked off for a well made 37 off 51 much to the delight of their skipper who had a few words to say but once he had realised out that this was village cricket and taken his anti -dickhead pill he calmed down somewhat.
In walked Joe Millen around who worked well with Paul for a while but then nicked off for 4, this brought Adamson to the crease to come and and pick up the run rate - and that he did with some lovely ball striking sticking it all around the ground and getting us past 150 , Paul departed soon after for a excellent 58, well batted.
Filmer came in next and got his classic late cut out for 4 before departing for 10 , Horrocks arrived , Horrocks then departed , This brought in Norts for abit of late on biffing with matt , this sadly didnt last long as matt holed out shortly after for 47,yet more jug avoidance... Keith then came in and scored a quick 6 , to finish the innings off Freddie and Norts ran well getting us past 190 , with a couple lovely boundries from both.
We had ended up on 193.
After a delightful tea the familiar opening bowling partnership of Adamson and Baker started us off , Matt with good pace and nip-backers and Baker frustrating the bats as they wait half an hour for the ball to get down the other end... Anyway they both started well with matt picking up a wicket in his second over with the aforementioned nipbacker and baker in his 3rd , Bakes bowled through and Matt came back on at the death with 9-2-24-1 for Matt and 9-0-33-1 for Baker.
Slevin and Paul came on in the middle overs and did well picking up 4 wickets between them getting out the set bats, it was good spell for Slev who got there opener out who was on 55 at the time with a lovely bowled 9-3-35-3, Paul also was doing well 8-0-43-2 and at 113 for 6 after 30 ish overs we thought the game was in our hands..
Little did we know it was about to turn into a thriller.
It was a hard fought last 10 with a few of there lower order coming in for abit of swing , which sadly came off despite some brave bowling from Salter who eventually got out there attacking no6 , the onslaught continued for all the bowlers at the death , despite this we managed to get it down to the last over which was being bowled by Millen around, they needed 7 would we do it?
Unfortunately not, they knocked it off with just 1 ball remaining , a frustrating near loss but a good game for the neutral , we put a good effort in in the field and we move on to next week, back home against West Farleigh.
Thanks to Outwood for the lovely teas
Cheers
Baker.