Given the poor weather Reed travelled in hope rather than expectation to far flung Northwood on Saturday. After the rain ceased the pitch was deemed fit for play and a reduced overs match 44 v 38 Overs was decided. Skipper James Heslam won the toss and given the weather forecast, and the possibility of stealing a march on some other promotion contenders who had already seen their matches rained off, he decided to field first.
Reed got off to a good start with Northwood slipping to 20-2 after 7 overs, and then 41-3, but opener Rodgers proved difficult to dislodge and the home team scoring rate averaged almost 4 runs an over and reached 95-4 after 25 overs with Porharkar dismissed at that stage for 23. All the Reed bowlers bowled reasonably tidily without dominating at any stage and Rodgers passed his 50 and pressed on with building a sizeable personal total. Tom Greaves 12 Overs 3 – 48 was Reeds most successful bowler but Rodgers scored 92 before being run out late in the innings. A late flurry saw Northwood total 183-8 a disappointingly high score to concede in the conditions and in only 44 Overs, with a bonus of 7 extra balls conceded to the opposition in Reed wides and no balls.
With only 3 bowling points and only single batting points on the table Reed knew that to secure any meaningful points total from the match they had to record a win. A good start saw the Heslam brothers put on 27 in 4 overs but then Will fell caught for 6 and Tom Greaves followed shortly after for a duck. At 36 for 2 after 8 overs a big partnership was needed and James Heslam did his best to oblige. He raced to 50 off 48 balls, 7×4’s and a 6, and seemed destined to put Reed in with a big chance, but then, with score on 72-2, in the 16th over a ball from 1st change bowler Nandiraja squeezed through his defence and trickled back onto his stumps just dislodging a bail. Worse was to follow as in the next over Chris Jackson appeared harshly adjudged LBW for 13 and Sean Tidey perished 3 balls later caught for a duck! 72-2 had become 73-5 and Reed were now on the defensive. Phil Frenay quickly went LBW for 1 (80-6) but Marcus Martin batted well in partnership with Jack Tidey before h e was out for 30 with the score 118. Jack went caught for 16 only 4 runs later and the Reed innings subsided to a poor 126 all out and defeat by 57 runs. For the 3rd week in a row fragile batting had cost the team dear and this time they recorded only 3 Points for their long journey and their afternoons work. The top of Division 2 is very tight and Reed are only 18 points behind the leaders and have to play 5 of the bottom 6 sides in their remaining 9 matches. Plenty to play for but the batting needs more focus and concentration if promotion is to be achieved.
