Hatfield Hyde won the toss and elected to bat, on a hot sunny day with what appeared to be a good pitch for batting.
Reed opened the bowling with Matt Giblin, who hit the right lines from ball one and immediately got the ball to swing in the air. Alan Ward opened the bowling from the other end, and the combination greatly restricted Hatfield’s run scoring in the opening overs.
The first wicket fell at 14-1, in the eleventh over, caught by Owen Hughes at mid on, after the Hatfield openers got frustrated with their low run rate.
Owen Hughes replaced Giblin after his opening spell, and also bowled impressive lines, with movement away from the right handed batsmen. After rebuilding their innings to 51-1, Hughes picked up two cruicial wickets in quick succession, both caught off his bowling, including an impressive reaction catch at square leg from Bowman. Hughes Finished with superb figures of 6-2-14-2.
Bernie Morss was was the second change, replacing Alan Ward. Adding some variation to the attack, he also bowled very tight lines, including 5 maidens within his 12.3 over spell. Morss picked up 3 wickets, ending with figures of 12.3-5-16-3.
The catch of the day went to Alan Ward off his own bowling- Hatfield’s number 7 absolutely nailed a straight drive back to Ward, who realised it best to catch the ball to avoid an inevitable broken rib.
Giblin picked up a further 2 wickets in his second spell, ending with solid figures of 14-4-26-3.
Hatfiled ended on 83 all-out, with the final wicket coming as a run-out.
In reply, Reed opened the batting with Rob Willoughby and Rhodri Hughes. They got off to a slow start, as the pitch was fairly difficult to bat on and runs were not given away freely by Hatfield’s openers. Rhodri was first to fall, bowled for 10.
Willoughby batted well for his 33 runs, and cleverly hit 2 no-balls straight to the hands of fielders in a ploy to further frustrate the opposition field. Morss batted at number 3, playing an impressive innningd for his 18 not out, and putting on a partnership of 60 with Willoughby for the second wicket.
Willougyhby was eventually bowled for 33. Bowman, having expressed great concern that he feared he would get a duck, proved his concerns to be valid, getting caught without troubling the scorers.
This left the elder of the Naeem Brothers, Michael to hit the remainder of the runs. He decided to take one ball to see himself in, before adopting his usual batting strategy, ending with 9 not out and seeing Reed to victory.
