Picko Leads the Way in 3s Victory

(The final welcome goes to Darryl Prendergast, another Kiwi who will be the overseas player for the 3rds this season. He played with Matt Pickering 20+ years ago at Uni and hasn't played since. Matt has, and it showed on Saturday. 1-0 to Matt.)

The first game to be played of the 2018 season took the 3s to the seaside and a trip to Cleethorpes. The game was rearranged from a Saturday to allow us to play on their main ground, allowing many of us to enjoy the views from the pavilion balcony.

Cleethorpes won the toss and chose to bowl so Begley and the debutant overseas Prendergast opened up. It was a solid opening partnership of 52 before Prendergast fell for 20 in the 12th over. Pickering came to the crease and another great partnership was formed. Begley (34) was next to go; bowled having "lost patience". Hugo joined Picko with the score 122-2 after 28 overs and was keen to get some runs under his belt. Aided with advice from Picko (having reached his half century), Hugo dug in for a bit before both pressed on the pedal and the runs started to flow. Both were five runs away from their respective landmarks when Hugo decided to go big again but was bowled for 45 and the score was 217-3 from 42 overs; their wonderful 95 partnership from 14 overs put us well in control. Martin Carrick came in for some valuable time in the middle which saw Picko complete a great knock of 101 not out. The 3s finished 230-3.

Cleethorpes made a good start to the chase as early wickets were hard to come by. Sophie and Kafait both bowled reasonably well with Kafait taking the first wicket, bowling their captain. The score 21-1. A frustrating second partnership took the score to 97 before Noble struck twice and we felt an opening appeared with new batsmen at the crease. When the fourth wicket fell with the score on 126 this really opened the door in the lineup and Noble continued his spell to take four wickets in his 10 overs. The debutant Prendergast got in on the action and took a wicket with a fine take from Harry behind the stumps. The score was now 126-6 with Begley taking over from Noble and Burglar Bill (Brett) also coming on for Prendergast. Brett did claim one wicket but was out-burgled by Begley who claimed 3-8 from his 3.3 overs, sealing the win by 82 runs as Cleethorpes were bowled out for 148.

So 20 points in the bag added to the previous five for the washout last week, a decent start to the campaign. It is a week off next week to return in May for a busy run of fixtures.

Report by Matt Brett