Minchinhampton 1st XI vs Charlton Kings 2nd XI

Minch hosted Charlton Kings at Stuart Fields and pleased to be back playing again after a very stop start beginning to the season with rain.

Skipper Pete Wallis had a side loaded with batsmen but the naturally damp Minch wicket looked bowler friendly and Wallis chose to have a bowl first. Minch had the perfect start as Wallis lead from the front with a wicket in his 1st over, young Attwood unfortunate to play the ball onto his stumps. Backed up by the miserly veteran John Turton Minch applied real pressure and runs were very hard to come by. Turton bowled through with figures of just 10 runs from 9 overs and unlucky not to get a wicket. Wallis came off after 6 overs and Jaime Waring entered the attack also picking up a wicket in hist 1st over, a regulation full toss clipped to mid wicket where brother Alex Waring took a sharp catch. Opener Parsley batted slowly but held his wicket and firstly Mitchell (27) and Roberts (21) tried to up the run rate. Minch turned to Simon Penn & Ross Britton for their 1st league bowls of the season and after a couple of wayward 1st overs found some good rhythm. Penn dismissed Mitchell caught by Brunsdon and Britton plugged away to no avail. Brunsdon also had a bowl taking 2 good wickets from his 3 over cameo.  Minch sensed hope of a collapse when Parsley finally went for 43 followed by Ranj and Bower as Wallis returned to good effect with 2 more wickets and a clever ‘kicked’ run out. But a very useful 37 not out by Cutler at no.6 boosted the Charlton Kings score upto 175 for 8 from their 45 overs, skipper Wallis the pick of the bowling with 3 for 21.

In reply Minch started at fast pace. Alex Waring put away 4 quick boundaries as Minch raced to 50 off the first 9 overs. But he fell for 16 as a quicker ball by Ranj was caught at square leg. The experienced due of fellow opener Rich Scott (40) and Pete Raphael at no3 (38) built a 70 run partnership to take Minch to 100 inside 21 overs as Minch were cruising. But when left armer White accounted for both of them, both caught and quickly followed by Brunsdon for 5, Minch wobbled slightly. Will Price and Ross Britton batted in their usual aggressive fashion, Price hammering the ball to the boundary as the got Minch to 155 and now just 21 needed from 13 overs. But when Price fell for 33 and Britton 28, both caught, Minch wobbled again. Simon Penn fell caught behind for a duck and it left Jaime Waring and Dave Cruickshank to scramble runs by any means, Waring hitting the winning runs finally with 7 overs to spare as Minch won by 3 wickets.

A good win for the 1st XI they keep up an impressive winning home record spanning over 3 years now.