U12B's BEATEN BY SAWBRIDGEWORTH

Sawbridgeworth chose to bat first and had a slow start with the second pair losing 5 wickets to some tight bowling from Seb P and Daniel P. Seb was the pick of the bowlers on the evening taking 3 for 3 in two overs. The following three batting pairs were much stronger, with some uncharacteristically loose leg side bowling helping them along the way. Sawbridgeworth finished with a score of 278 including the loss of 9 wickets. The Eagles response was steady, but Sawbridgeworth bowled a very tight line restricting the scoring rate. Kimball top scored with a couple of lovely boundaries including a textbook backward cut that was one of the best shots I’ve seen at this level all year. As the last pair, Will R & Austin G came into bat, they were facing an uphill struggle, as despite the Eagles only losing 3 wickets in the first 4 pairs, the score had only moved onto 240. They made a valiant effort to score 39 off four overs to win. 9 runs were scored off their first over with some fine running between the wickets. But then the wickets started to tumble as they played riskier and riskier shots in an attempt to score the runs. It was a good fixture, but just not the Eagles night with Sawbridgeworth winning comfortably in the end. A big thanks to Andy Pickup for covering the game and for doing this excellent report!