Ricky 3's Vs Ickleford 3's

So after a Batting Nightmare last Weekend, Ricky Three's were once again asked to bat first on a newly cut strip. All the issues Ricky batsman moaned about the previous week were soon put to bed when Icklefords opening Bowler fizzed the first 4 deliveries past Owen opening again with the skipper., The pitch had pace and bounce with the new ball and the three's openers look to make the most of it dispatching the first 3 overs for 20 runs before Owen fell bowled to a fuller ball just nipping back again like the previous week lack of foot movement let him down. Mr Chairman promoted to number 3 after last week performance again came in and looked comfortable pushing the total passed 50 before a surprise bouncer, yes i said bouncer caught skipper out who could only pick out square leg after not get enough of it. Ricky then began to wobble and was this the usual collapse we had seen the last few weeks, as Adeels luck and lack of runs causing a loose shot to sky a easy catch to depart for 2 leaving 3's now 57-3. Bilal came in at 5 and played his way blocking the straight ones and swinging the bat on everything else which helped push the score along, with Mark happy to give Bilal the strike, they put on a solid 35 runs with Mark scoring 4 of these to push Ricky to 92-4 and a good solid start to look to score some runs in the latter overs Ben Alnutt then came in a did what only Ben does hit the ball hard and run even harder turning ones into two's and pressure on the Ickleford fielders pushing the score to 132 before trying one too many and running out Bilal (40) on a single that was probably not on. Still with 5 wickets in hand and 10 overs to go 180/190 was on the cards, but again Ricky let ourselves down being all out for 151 off 44th Over only another 19 runs added with the last 4 wickets going for 0 runs.
151 runs was at least a target and one we were confident we could defend, and after a little coaxing of the opposition skipper to get them to bat in a little bit of rain things started well for Ricky Brendan(10-4-17-0) and Naeem keeping it tight for the first few overs. Brendan bowling 4 maidens to keep Ickleford well under the required rate, but for me a big turning point in the game Opener Deacon with a edge so loud they heard it at the canal festival off Brendans bowling was unmoved and given not out, absolutely disgusting decision and what made this worse as Deacon would go on and produce a match winning 48*, we did not help by dropping him twice. The Ickleford batsman batted really sensibly only needing 3 and over and managed to get the target in the 45th Over. A massive positive for Ricky was Rohan Karat on debut who bowled quick and despite sliding all over the place ended up with figures of (10-3-22-2) the big negative was extra's 36 when we needed to bowl wicket to wicket was our downfall.
3 defeats from 3 now and why i needed a beer after the game because the effort was there this week and we gave it everything but lost another game its starting to hurt so on to Potten End a new team to the league who have scored over 300 runs in all there games so far so the three's need to be at there very best.