Ricky beat Radlett to get back on track

The mind games had begun before the match, with the Radlett skipper saying how weak they were. Naturally, this is par for the course, and Ricky were not surprised to see a Radlett team comprising various experienced players, including ex-captains. Radlett won the toss and with their powerful batting line up decided to bat first. Ricky's luck turned from bad to worse as veteran keeper, Neil Burdett, took a ball to the forehead in the 2nd over and had to go to Hospital with a gaping head wound. Ricky were down to 10 men for the rest of the game.

Luckily Waseem chose this game to bowl his finest spell for Ricky, tying down both opening bats and Taqadas also bowled well and 21/0 off 10 overs (mostly wides) was not a great start for Radlett. However this remains probably the best track in our division and the boundaries were brought very close and so the runs inevitably started to flow. However Ricky also took wickets at regular intervals and Rishi kept magnificently behind the stumps. Ronesh got turn and bounce and Raz bowled his best spell of the season. But from 119/6, the Radlett batsmen kept coming and were able to play through the line up until the last overs, taking 90 off the last 15 and posting 205. This was deemed maybe 15 short of a good total, but it would take some getting against what was likely to be dibbly-dobbly pace-off bowlers after tea.

Paul and Rishi opened the batting and from ball one, Paul in particular, set about the chase with vigour. This is a good opening pair, having posted 50 in the last game, and so it proved again as they raced to 70 off 17 overs before Paul was bowled off an under-edge for a very aggressive 46. What followed was a slight period of inactivity with Rishi and Asif, on debut, struggling to get the slower bowlers away and Rishi and then Asif perished with Ricky now behind that rate on 83/3 after 25 overs. 8 overs for 13 runs had caused Ricky to stall and with Raz and Bobby at the wicket, Ricky needed to both score over 5 an over AND keep wickets intact. Raz was the main aggressor for the next 10 overs whilst Bobby kept his powder dry. With 68 needed off 10 overs, Bobby exploded into action, pulling and cutting prolifically, 15 off that over. Now 50 off 10 and both players were striking the ball well. With only 20 needed and 5 overs, Raz was bowled. But his partnership with Bobby of 102 had put Ricky firmly in charge. There was just time for Kamran to hit a 6, and Ronesh to hit two boundaries and that was it - game over and Ricky had won by 5 wickets.

A good team effort by 10 men. We won it for Neil Burdett.