Radlett IV's have been a League team for over 25 years. Originally called Radlett B, they were the only club, Radlett, to be allowed to have 4 teams in the Herts Leagues. This has now changed with many clubs have 3,4 or even 5 teams. Radlett 3rds are in the same Division as our 1st XI and their 5ths are in the same division as our 4th XI. So we get to play Radlett a lot, and by coincidence our 1st team play Radlett III on Saturday as well. A traditional double-header. Old School.
Radlett 4ths finished 2nd bottom last year in Div 5B and were only saved relegation by a league restructuring. They won 2 games batting first and two games batting second and generally chose to bat first after the half-way point of the season. They were very much a yo-yo team, sometimes scoring big and sometimes being bowled out for below 100. They did amass a decent avarge of 6.5 wickets per game in the matches they didn't win. And only twice failed to take less than 5 wickets. A dangerous side when bowling it would seem.
Radlett IV lost their first game last week being bowled out for 124, which Ware 1st team chased down for the loss of 5 wickets. Early season form is hard to gauge, but interestingly Radlett failed to put out a 5th team and their 3rd team got beaten as well. However, they are probably looking at our own result against Bushey and thinking that there are 30 easy points on offer.
This week we need to put 20:20 mode out of our minds and focus on selling our wickets for a high price and batting 50 overs (if needed). A much changed top order will hopefully bring us some luck for a game that we really don't want to lose.