Safety First!
Or rather, the Firsts are Safe!
After a frankly thrilling match at home on Saturday, the first team are now mathematically safe from relegation this season. Indeed, their sights are now set on those above them in the table rather than those below after three successive wins! The second team fared less well and still haven’t reached absolute certainty of retaining their Third Division place, but it would take an incredible run of results in the last three matches for it to all go wrong now.
On an overcast but dry Saturday afternoon the first team took to the field confident – perhaps a little over confident – of a win against bottom placed Foulridge, a team with just one win to their name from very early on in the season. However, things didn’t go according to plan as wickets fell steadily, with one opposing bowler in particular having his game of the season, picking up 5 wickets. Only Mohammad Shahnawaz really got to grips with the Foulridge bowling, smashing an imperious 49 before an unfortunate mix-up saw him run out just shy of what would have been a well justified half century. Only Asfaq Abdul-Hamid (17) really managed to push the score upwards otherwise, and 91 all out felt like a seriously below-par score.
The only chance Riddlesden had was to bowl spectacularly well. They did!
Mohammed Zulfiqar and Zahir Abbas (2-16) bowled stunningly accurately and gave nothing away, backed up by quick, committed fielding from all. After eleven overs, Foulridge had limped along to 12-2. A fightback was mounted by the star bowler from earlier – his 24 runs came slowly but steadily, edging the total ever closer to the required 92. But then Mohammad Shahnawaz came into the attack, clearly still with something to prove after his disappointment in missing out on a fifty earlier, and quickly rearranged his stumps. And if the opening bowlers had been hard to score from, Shanny was a real miser, conceding just 13 runs from 12.2 overs, and picking up 3 wickets along the way. Zullie also roared back into action, taking a fantastic hat-trick to leave with figures of 6-31 from 15 overs. Foulridge’s batting collapsed, their last 7 wickets falling for just 14 runs, ending all out for 73 – the Firsts had won!
I’m not going to say much about the second team, other than they returned from their game at Long Lee unwilling to go into details beyond ‘they got loads, we didn’t get many’. For the record, Long Lee smashed 233-8 (with Bob Morrisroe being the pick of the bowlers with 3-40) and we responded with 89 all out, with Steve Kernan and Steve McGarry joint top-scoring with 18 each. Chalk it up as a bad day against good opposition and move on to next week.
With other results in the third division having gone our way at the bottom, the 2nds still lie in 8th place with three to play. The 1sts have drawn level with Ingrow St Johns in 8th place, and are currently the form side in the first division.
On to this week’s fixtures (and remember, it’s September by Saturday so 1:30pm start time)
1st team are home again vs. Oakworth – I’m sure we’d like to do the double over them...
2nd team away vs. Cononley – another tough match but a win secures safety!