Ricky 1st XI win away at Tewin

A glorious sunny day awaited us in Tewin, Tewin had been promoted from Div 7A so it would be a good test for ricky against a team that had only lost one game last season.

New skipper for 2018 Maz Shah won the Toss and decided to bowl on a wicket he was not too sure on how it would play...

Ricky bowling attack had been strengthened with young Toqeer making his debut and Bobby being promoted form 2's to the 1's. There was a good buzz within the team and you could tell the lads were up for a good fight!

Tewin started very cautiously mainly due to the excellent line and length bowled by Magic Man Majid and young pacy Toqeer

Tewin were 32-0 off 10 overs so skip decided to change the bowling and bring in Bobby and left arm spinner Zaf, zaf who bowled a super line tied down one end for us so we could attack the other. He bowled 10 over for 21 runs not taking a wicket but due to his efforts this pretty much tied up Tewin and the other end Bobby struck in his first over! Tewin then put on a decent partnership of 47 but it took them 20 overs as the bowlers were rotated.

It was time to bring on Billy the Kid! who took two quick wickets in two overs, he bowled superb line and length with nothing being wasted. Billy was superb but ended his day in agony as he twisted his knee and had to be carried off the pitch with figures of 5.5 overs 3 wickets for 23 runs. It was thanks to Billy that the Tewin collapse started and the rest of the bowlers melt blood especially young toqeer! who ened up with 3-15 of 8.3 overs on debut, we are expecting big things from Toqeer this season. all the bowlers deserve a mention as they kept the pressure on from both ends. Bobby finished on 2-24 off 8

So we were set a target of 135 to win off 50 overs, Maz and Hailey aka Grenade aka Hovercraft opened the innings with Maz deciding it was best to get these runs quickly and hit the opening bowler for two big sixes over the sight screen in the first over! this set the tone and Tewin knew they were in trouble, Hailster got adjudged LBW though it looked a little high playing on the front foot. This brought Div 6A's leading run scorers from last season together, Taz Shehabi Joined Maz at the crease and they both carried on from last season. Hitting big shots with singles and doubles. Maz ( that would be me writing this report , which is a bit awkward) hit six sixes on his way to 58 and putting on a 98 run partnership with Taz. Its always a pleasure to watch Taz bat when he is in full flow and hopefully he can repeat what he did last season and win batsman of the year in this league.

with the score on 110 and needing 24 to win Maz got caught at square leg trying out his new shot called the Hadookan

what followed was some silly strokes as we ended up winning by 5 wickets in 26 overs, truth being we should have lost 1 wicket max!

Skippers thoughts " Excellent start by the guys, bowling unit looks strong but little disappointed in losing those 3 wickets at the end, Long way to go but you can only beat the team in-front of you"