Reed III’s hosted Langleybury III’s for mid table Saracens Herts League Clash, both teams were looking to secure crucial points in the match. Reed won the toss and elected to bat, which seemed a good decision as Willoughby (12) crunched his first three deliveries to the boundary, however the over excitement got the better of him as he was caught on the fourth. This set the tone for much the innings, with Peter Baker (0) and Zac Conley (6) following soon after. Rhodri Hughes (10) and Mike Robertson (11) both made starts but again fell cheaply, Father and son Maseeh (10) and Matt (0) Naeem also followed suit with the bowling of Cooper (8.5-48-6) doing the most damage. It was Owen Hughes (26*) who steadied the ship, calmly facing out overs and increasing the total with contributions from Ian Roberts (5) aggressive stroke play from Josh Conley (17) and tail end flair from Joe Graves (26) pushing Reed on to the meagre total of 155 all out.
Langleybury had plenty of overs to get the runs and Reed thought that they would be lucky to prevent them chasing the runs down. However veteran Ian Roberts put in the performance of his life. Langleybury lost their first wicket in the first over by Owen Hughes, when he bowled Denham. Roberts then had Mullipudi caught with his second ball and bowled Honey with his 12th. Over the next 30 overs Roberts, bowling an immaculate length and swinging the ball away accounted for six more batsmen, ending with 15 overs, 4 maidens, 8 wickets for 38 runs. Opening batsman Gunning being left stranded on 41 not out out of a total of 76 all out.
Reed 30 points, Langleybury 10 points.
The match led to Reed 3rds rising to fifth in the table with everything to play for in the second half of the season.
Report submitted by Michael Robertson.
