Minchinhampton 1stXI suffered a frustrating day away at Hardwicke on Saturday.  Travelling with an already depleted team skipper Pete Wallis was further hampered when his opening batsmen Alex Waring was called away to the birth of his first child in the early hours of the morning, leaving no time to find a replacement; Minch played with 10.

Despite the lack of regular first team players, Minch fielded and bowled with purpose. Turton and Wallis kept things tight at the start but it was Jaime Waring who did the damage with the ball taking 5 wickets off his 10 overs for 26 runs.  Marcus Cole also deserves a mention for a good 6 over spell and his first wickets for the first eleven.  Minch were delighted with their 10 man efforts in the field and restricted Hardwicke to 95 all out.

In reply Minch appeared to be cruising to victory at 28 with out loss, Penn and Scott looking in control.  Hardwicke had other ideas however and Lane had Penn removed with a superb catch when he looked well set. Scott and Price soon followed and Minch looked shaky.  Hardwicke applied pressure and bowled well, continued to take regular wickets and despite late resistance from Matt Hole and Marcus Cole, Minch were unable to put a good partnership together.  Minch were left stranded 10 runs short with 8 wickets down and Turton unable to bat.  In truth 2 more wickets should have been enough but it was just one of those days!