First defeat of the season

The 1st XI welcomed top of the table Old Camdenians to the Village. The opposition won the toss and decided to have a bowl.

Danny Potter & Jay Nandha opened the innings but Danny would fall in the 7th over for 3, which brought Majid Asif to the crease. Jay and Majid both played well and brought the 50 up for the Village with Jay playing some nice shots to get boundaries before he nicked off. Marcus Cara and Felix Charles would come and go without getting into double figures and when Maj was adjudged LBW the Village were 100-5 off 28 overs. This would soon become 109-7 as Devraj Ray and Saahil Mehra perished to the slow bowlers, David Overton and James Thompson looked to stay in and were adamant that they would try to bat the overs to try to get the Village to a total. Both were at the crease for a while and managed to tick the score along. Dave would get out trying to hit his usual shot through mid wicket and was unfortunate that the tallest player in the oppositions team stretched out a hand and caught the ball, but the pair had put on 27, although Dave had scored 14 in 50 balls. Obaid Ur Rehman came into bat and he and James would put on 41 for the 9th wicket with the pair working well together with James getting singles and running hard, with Obaid playing the big shots to up the rate. Obaid would get caught on 27 to bring Karan Gupta in as the last man but with a few more shots from James who ended 30 not out, the Village would post 185-9 in their 50 overs.

Saahil & Marcus opened the bowling as usual and bowled nicely but did not get the wickets that their performances deserved. Marcus would get the one wicket as he give the number 2 batsman a good send off as he tried to hoick one too many and got bowled. The next wicket would come as Obaid diverted a cover drive onto the stumps to run out the non striker. Then Old Camdenians took control of the match as the numbers 1 & 4 built a partnership that would get them the majority of the way to victory, although a few chances again went down which would prove crucial. Majid & Obaid bowled tightly as well to keep the pressure on but it was up to Dave to bring the Village back into the game with a 5 wicket haul as he decimated the middle order and give the Village a sniff. It came down to the last over and sadly they managed to get the run they needed for victory.

The Village would rue not scoring 20 or 30 more runs and dropping more catches but a win on Saturday will mean that the 1st XI are only 5 points behind Old Camdenians in the race for the title.