Bramcote 1st XI vs Southwell 1st XI

A repeat of each teams first game of the season, where Southwell had cruised past Bramcote, Southwell entered unbeaten with Bramcote looking for their first victory. On a drizzly overcast afternoon, Alex Rainbow, stand In skipper, put the home side into bat. The home side who had slumped to 64 in the first game of the year, would prove a harder nut to crack this time round. After a promising new ball partnership from Rainbow and Dan Sprawson the home side gathered some momentum through the middle overs, with Alec Watson and Thomas Chamberlain building a platform for Andrew Thorne's very special knock of 77*, Thorne dishing up some serious damage in the last 15 overs. A few spilt chances the visitors will rue, left Bramcote with a very decent total of 196/6.

Southwell fresh off an impressive run chase at home to Thrumpton, struggled to replicate the previous week's magic. As Rehman took 3 big top order wickets, Southwell's middle to lower order was left with an awful lot of work to do. Tom Foster, Jim Hemstock and David Rimmer, salvaged some valuable batting points for the visitors with some clean striking. Foster in particular looking very fluent on his return to the 1st team. With Southwell running out of time and Bramcote unable to bowl the visitors out, Bramcote claimed a winning draw and some valuable points.

As Vice Captain and Skipper on the day, I've thoroughly enjoyed our start to the season and I was desperate for us to go 4 from 4 and hand the keys back to Joe Fryer undefeated. It was therefore a disappointing result and performance in many ways as we had more than enough chances to win the game. However these things happen in cricket and with the XI players we are putting out each week we should be disappointed with anything less than a win. Roll on Beeston next week, some home cooking and hopefully 20 points!!!