A few weeks ago a friend called and asked "When are you coming over?" I replied "About four o'clock, over!".
We weren't on walkie talkies but it just felt like the right thing to say.

We were hosting Kirkby Portland on a lovely evening at Top Ground. On evenings like that it really lives up to it's name - Top Ground was looking a picture.

Captain Emily lost the toss and we were asked to bat first. Coach Grimmers gathered the team round and asked "What is our run target this evening?" to which there were various sensible suggestions. He posed the following challenge - "get to 10 overs with only a couple of wickets down then you can get 8 runs an over." More later.

The opposition kept on shouting “Come on KP!” so I anxiously looked around to see if Mr Pietersen was making a guest appearance. Silly me!

Zac and Greg were asked to open, with Zac making a brisk 15. Greg built a good foundation, before finally getting run out for 29. In the mean time, other good contributions were seen from Eliot, 26 not out, and Rob 23. We finished on 121 for 7 from our 20 overs. A really good effort.

Back to Stuart's team talk. After 10 overs we were about 40 for 2. His target of 8 an over from there did indeed take us to 121.  I have asked him to predict this Friday's Euro Millions lottery numbers for me.

We had a good bowling line up and started with Josh and Emily. Both bowled with good control in the main and restricted the runs well. Ruth and Eliot came on and continued the good work which was finished off by Zac and Greg. KP had two good contributions from Driscoll (30) and Jennings (36 retired) but never looked likely to get that close to the target as they finished on 103-7. 

Bowling figures:-
Emily 3 overs 2 for 10
Josh 4 overs 0 for 14
Ruth 4 overs 1 for 21
Eliot 4 overs 0 for 23
Zac 3 overs 3 for 19
Greg 2 overs 0 for 13

This was a good win, albeit against another young side. We did a number of things very well but still showed we have some areas where we can improve. Stuart marked the team in certain areas.

·         Batting:- Good run rate acceleration but running between the wickets - making 2s into 3s etc needs more consistency. (Grim factor score - 8 out of 10)

·         Fielding:- Good attacking of the ball and backing up but we dropped at least 4 catches which was out of character. Need to check positioning and work better with left and right hand combinations. Throwing was pretty good but we need to work on getting the ball away quicker (Grim factor score - 6 out of 10)

·         Bowling:- Very few bad balls giving limited scoring opportunities but 20 wides meant we bowled 3 extra overs at them which under different circumstances may have made the difference. Bowlers need to check their fields too (Grim factor score-  6 out of 10)

No Ollie + No Burgers = Definitely no John this week.

Emily was dancing in the streets of Southwell, well nearly, as she left a little early for dance classes. I am sure she was pleased with her team.

Team:-
Emily Stutchbury
Zac Ashworth
Greg Behl
Matty Bowles
Jake Saleh
Eliot Checkley
Rob Brown
Ruth Sprawson
Joe Stutchbury
Josh Cottam
Joe Ashworth (Thanks for stepping in at 16:45)

Thanks also to Stuart for umpiring.