Reed made the journey to the heart of leafy Hertfordshire, to play promotion rivals of recent seasons Frogmore. Balding pace man R Martin was amazingly called in to the twos but he was easily replaced by youngster Matt Giblin. Balding pace man Martin usually takes the new ball, but the honour was granted to Fitzgerald (0-31)and Ward (0-29). Ward was proving very wayward and very expensive and was taken off after only a few over’s and replaced by Fynn (12-2-58) who struck twice. Reed never looked like taking another wicket until Giblin came in to the attack and bowled extremely well, with good economy and snared the dangerous Bascott.
At 144-3 off just 29 over’s, skipper Naeem turned to Archer, and in a spell of accurate bowling taking 5-12 off 11.1 over’s Frogmore collapsed to 202 all out. Naeem’s off breaks accounting for the remaining two batsman. After looking at chasing well over 300 at one stage the total of 203 to win looked well within Reed’s grasp.
Unfortunately Frogmore’s extremely quick opening attack had not read the script they tore through the top order reducing Reed to 49-8. Giblin (32no) proved a worthy replacement for the balding pace man Martin with the bat also as firstly with Naeem (10) and then Archer (14) he helped steer Reed past the 3 figure mark.
Skipper Naeem was philosophical in defeat ” We played against a first team and even in Div 10, these teams can have players playing several divisions below their level. It did not help that we bowled so poorly to start with and none of the batsmen applied themselves and dug in. The undefeated “monkey” is now off our back and we expect to return to winning ways next week, when players make themselves available again”
