Kew Beat Third Team

Mark Bater won the toss and opted to field and once again gave the new ball to Toby Seagrave and Tom Powell-Williams. Seagrave, who bowled without much luck a week earlier, struck early when he bowled Kew opener Moaz Khan off an inside edge. Kew’s batsman then looked to build a partnership with Sandhu and Mahadevan taking the attack to our bowling.

With inspiration required, wicket-keeper David Crane created the next two wickets with a couple of excellent pieces of cricket. Firstly he stumped opener Kanwar Sandhu down the legside off the bowling of Ben Bezani and then a couple of overs later he ran out Imtiaz Ahmed with a direct hit at the bowlers end.

Our new and inexperienced back up bowling attack of Alan Sheppard, Harry Grinham and Chris Powell did a good job of stopping a full onslaught by our visitors, but Kew did manage to consistently find the boundary. Bater, brought Seagrave back into the attack to bowl at the death and his most experienced bowler didn’t let him down. Seagrave picked up a further four wickets as he ended with figures of 5-53 from his 10 overs as Kew ended up on 259 from their 45 overs.

Our reply was stalled by the early loss of Tom Powell-Williams and captain Mark Bater as we were quickly reduced to 25-2. Nick Wake was then joined by debutant Alex Broughton as the pair looked to make inroads into the Kew total.

Wake showed all his experience finding the gaps through the offside while Broughton used more brute force as he played strokes all around the ground. Wake brought up his second consecutive half century, but with the run rate rising, Broughton was caught behind for 39 and he was quickly joined back in the pavilion by James Wheeler who was also out caught behind.

Nick Wake was eventually dismissed for a very good 93, but despite cameos from Alan Shepperd and wicket-keeper David Crane the Third Team fell 26 runs short.