With the sun beating down at Denton Road, Horton had no doubt in batting first after winning the toss. The House started fast, but lost Karan Parmar (13) early. From 17-1, Fin Moffat and Harry Mowat rebuilt to 106 before Fin was caught for 55. James Watson would join Harry, and the two kiwis would put on sixty for the 3rd wicket before Harry was bowled for 47. Watson quickly followed for a fine 56, which started a Horton collapse from 162-2 to 188-8 with the middle and lower order stuttering against regulation bowling. Horton would limp to 206 before they were dismissed in the 48th over, probably 60+ short of where they needed to be.

Horton came out of the tea break swinging, with Kalpesh Chandracant (2-17) and Ben Meachem (1-32) making inroads during the opening spell. The duel spin of Karan Parmar and Anvit Arkanath would continue to chip away, with Anvit bowling two exceptional off-spin deliveries to castle two of the Haddon middle order. Despite some late order counterattacking, Haddon were bowled out for 137 with Parmar (3-39) only bested by an outstanding spell of 9-2-37-4 from Anvit. Horton claimed the 25 points and now sit fourth in the league.

2nd XI vs. Horton House CC 2nd XI

The 2’s travelled to Billing Road for our 10th Match of the season against ON’s 4th Team.
Having won the toss we decided to bowl first on warm day.
Having asked for a professional and ruthless performance this is exactly what all the team did for the majority of our time in the field which was pleasing. All the team stuck to the task in very hot conditions, supporting each other during the 3hrs we were in the field. There were wickets for Harvey Banks (4), Steve Finch (3), Rory Monk (2), and Arnav Jain (1).
ON’s 4ths finished their innings 187 all out in 44 Overs.

We set about chasing 187 with Craig Reilly and Finn Herrington opening the innings. Craig and Finn put on a solid 41 for the first wicket. All six of out batters who batted played well and contributed to us securing the win scoring 191 off 33 overs, with only 4 wickets lost. There were runs for Craig (43), Harvey Banks (35), Vignesh (39), Tom H (25).
This win meant that the 2’s have now won 7 out of 10 league games so far this season.

3RD XI vs. Long Buckby CC 2nd XI

Horton House bowled out Long Buckby for 109. Taylor 4-34, Holmes 2-18 and Richardson 2-15. Horton knocked them off for the loss of 3 wickets thanks to a superb 59* from Abhinav Kulur, backed up by 25* from Ryan Monk.

4th XI vs. Braunston Paddox CC 2nd XI

The Legends were home this weekend at the Bozeadome against division high flyers Braunston Paddox. On a week where the heat was going to be a factor a big thank you to the grounds team at Bozeat – Fred Jeys, Josh Gould and Harry Mowat – for watering, mowing and rolling the wicket.

Horton have had many tussles with Braunston but we have yet to have “do them over” in a kinda Eastender story line way. With it predicted to be a hot day as it was last week, lessons of hydration and concentration, were hopefully learnt – and I did say hopefully.

Winning the toss, as per usual the Legends were batting. It was not only at 30 degrees but the wind was also blowing hard and with the sight screens bellowing (new ones are on order Sai) and bails falling off, it was going to testing for the batsmen. Opening with Siddhant Auddy and Harry Street, Siddy got to work and was pushing the run rate and petty much left off from is form last week. Harry unfortunately got a first baller, off his glove – but I wanted to quote what was written about that dismissal in the Braunston match report - “There was little or no deviation and with the noise of the wind only those downwind and close to the bat could hear anything. Fair credit to the young batsman then as he "walked" and reluctantly trudged his way back to the pavilion for what was technically a first ball duck. Cricket was the winner here as the umpire was obviously not sure that there had been any contact with the bat and may not have given him out. Well done to the young batsman for making the umpire's job easier. If only everyone could be that honest.” Returning Alan Pitt, got out to probably the worst ball of the match dragging a ball that would have been deemed a double wide onto his stumps and that was followed by Siddy missing a straight one that he tried to pull and getting out LBW. That brought the father and son combo of Sainath Ravikumar (14) and Srikrishnav Sainath (38) together – with a clear plan of seeing off the opening bowlers and rightly so as we were strugging at 44-4. Both started rebuilding the innings but Sai got caught but an incredible catch and that brought our own Rishab Pant aka The V Man aka Vaman Mallipedda to the crease. Thankfully the first two balls where played in a text book manner but that was already too much and Vaman got us a quick fire 35 and pushed us to a par score of 125 for 6. But there was more fireworks to come in the last 3 overs when Harry Farbon (38 from 26) and Nick Inwood (20 from 19) got the Legends to 191 for 7 with some huge hitting and hard running. That was an excellent batting performance once again and was a great example in application from the middle and lower order batsmen.

Opening the innings with Street and Monk, was the tried and tested formula that we continued with. Harry was bowling tight lines and which meant that Alex was able to make inroads into the top-order. Srikrishnav Sainath and Harry Farbon were first change, and that is where the match turned on it’s head. Farbon removed the dangerous Ash Day and skipper Rakesh Patel whist Kris set about collecting figures of 5-0-21-5 – his very first 5fer. Excellent keeping from Alfie Inwood meant that all but 2 byes went against him and was another reason that he were able to maintain pressure on such a strong team. Braunston ended up 62 all out.

Another performance that we can all be proud of but as Kobe used to say “The job is never finished” – Keep Training, Keep Working – Monday Night (Conditioning and Feilding) – Tuesday Night Nets