Phew, what a scorcher!
As the tabloid press say...
At last we managed to have a proper summer's day on a Saturday last week for the trip over to Bradley. It was hot. The sun beat down. There was no toilet paper, or milk! Nor an umpire... Yes, Bradley had no umpire, and as Steve was on holiday neither did we. This posed a problem. Fortunately we had taken our 12th man, Mick Cryer, and both teams agreed to 'Get the Game On' by appointing him umpire for the day. So match saved!
Having been put in to bat, Riddlesden found it tough going in the heat. Steve Kernan perished early having already been struck on the foot. Dale Pinkerton had an incredible piece of fortune as the ball hit the top of the wicket but failed to dislodge the bails as it skipped off the top of them - but he didn't make much use of that luck as he departed for just one. Mohammad Shahnawaz struck a beautiful four off his first ball, but failed to add further. Only Mohammad Qadeer looked comfortable with a strong 48, with a short cameo from Akeel Rashid (13). Nobody else scored double figures and we were dismissed for just 103 in the 30th over.
On the bowling front, only Shanny really excelled (1-16 off 8 overs) as Bradley eased to victory for the loss of just 3 wickets. There were a few dropped catches once again that let the side down, but really we were a long way short of setting a competitive target.
So we are still bottom of the division with just 1 point. There are two teams on 5 points who must be targeted - Thornton-in-Craven who won their first game and have since picked up 2 abandonments (including us!), and Sandy Lane who beat Thornton-in-Craven for their only win. So it's a three-way shootout at the bottom. Worryingly we play Sandy Lane on July 1st, but we have nobody who can be captain due to the requirement to be DBS checked as Jamie is unavailable. We need more players to be DBS checked to avoid this problem. Solutions are being sought as it would be terrible to have to concede to our nearest rivals simply due to this.
It's been a hard season so far - we could do with a win this weekend as we welcome Skipton CI to Riddlesden. They are well up the table with 4 wins so far, so it's a big ask, but we need the points desperately so let's do it this week, yes?
And to finish with, Riddlesden U11 team played their first two matches this week. Both ended in defeats, but everyone who played seemed to really enjoy themselves, and that's the main thing. Skills will improve - we're the new and inexperienced team - but the commitment was clear to see, as were the smiles. Well done juniors.