Tight match at Wooburn

On a bitterly cold day at Wooburn, Wargrave overcame the home side by 10 runs in a low scoring game. Winning the toss and deciding to bat the Wargrave batsmen struggled on a bowler friendly pitch.

Only three of the batters managed to score more than 10, Mandip at no 5 top scored with 37 including 3 of his trade mark sixes. Archie, taking 14 balls before bothering the scorer, batted neatly, and Kevin with an innings befitting that of a number 10, both contributed 19 in a total of 142.

All in all it was unfortunate that the batsmen, in their last chance before the start of the league season, were confronted by the dismal weather and the difficult pitch. Several in their first game needed to get their eyes in, but it was not to be.

As is the case in these early season friendlies, Mandip again tested the scorer's collection of coloured pens, by using 8 different bowlers. Jordan opening his spell with a wide had an eventful first over, taking 2 for 11, and finished on 4 for 29. Mandip cleverly came on in the 30th over and quickly closed the innings with a pair of wickets.

The highlight of the Wooburn innings came from Mick Farnham scoring a dogged 45 not out from 70 balls. The match may have been over sooner if a couple of catches had not been dropped, but no blame can attach as most of the fielder's fingers must have resembled icicles.

Next week sees the start of the League programme. With it will come greater challenges and new rules to be taken into consideration. For the first time the team needs to pay attention to it's over rate with a compulsory league requirement of 17 overs per hour. Failure to meet this results in the loss of points.

Good luck to all the players for the coming season with the added hope that it warms up a bit.