Halverstown 2: 59 All out off 27 overs

H2 Batting: J.Hodgson 20 A.Syed 11 D.Drumm 5* D.Foster 4 S.Hayes 3

L2 Bowling: W.Khan 4-2-3-4 Sheraz 4-10-3 Umar 6-1-11-2 M.John 5-13-1

Longford 2: 62 for 4 off 18 overs

L2 Batting : I Sheikh 21 J.Ali 13* W. Khan 8* M.Saqib 7

H2 Bowling: B.Mer 2-1-1-1 D.Foster 2-4-1 D.Drumm 3-1-6-1 A.Barber 2-1-8-1

S.Hayes 2-1-3-0 M.Hodgson 2-4-0 A.Syed 2-10-0 B.Langford 2-15-0 M.Bukhari 1-10-0

Table-topping , high scoring Longford showed just why they are such. Their late arrival and the dubious weather saw us agree to a 35 over game but they definitely didn’t need that many. We batted first and struggled almost from the start. Jim Hodgson and Ahsan started fairly well and put on 21 between them - Jim was to be our star batter, lasting 62 balls for his 20 and keeping most of the team company. Indeed his was the eighth wicket to fall .Waqar Khan, a Cyprus international (playing Division 20 ?!!), tore through our middle order with his 4 wickets for 3 runs. Sheraz’ 3 for 10 was also devastating. Indeed only 5 batsmen scored any runs whatsoever. 6 ducks! Excluding extras we scored 42. Was their bowling quite that good? 

Given that Longford regularly score over 300 we did not entertain much hope of a win. Indeed any hope. Nevertheless we stuck to our task of trying to take wickets and keep their scoring rate down. A glance at the bowling statistics will show that we didn’t do too badly at all, particularly since I offered a bowl to everyone who was interested. Nine took up the challenge! We fielded solidly also but where we fell down was our catching. Not that it would have won us the game, but the 4 catches we missed would certainly have given Longford a bit more pause for thought. Against that I can recall just one missed catch by them. 

We earned two bonus points and were not disgraced in a tough contest with a very strong team that certainly does not belong in Division 20, nor anywhere near it. 

Written by Des Drumm.