Cutthopre frustrated by the rain

The players arrived to persistent rain, but by the start time the skies had cleared and the game began on time. Cutthorpe captain David Bush won the toss and decided to bowl first.

Although both opening bowlers Josh Savage and Asad Butt bowled well early on, the wicket wouldn’t come.

Numerous times the Quarndon batsmen, Adrian Rollins and Michael Lidsey played and missed or miscued the ball into vacant areas, and when the early chance came, Lidsey edging Butt to Sunny Munir at second slip, it went down. The luck finally turned though when Steve Chapman was introduced into the attack.

He found another leading edge from Rollins (25) and Bush took a good catch diving forwards at cover. Soon after, Andy Knowles who had been introduced into the attack found the edge of Raja Sohail Haider and he was caught behind by Paul Burdett for just two to leave Quarndon 56-2.

From here Quarndon looked to the up the tempo of their innings. Lidsey was joined by captain Nathan Dumelow and they started to take the attack to the Cutthorpe bowlers.

Lidsey, who had just struck a big blow down the ground for six, was out the following ball when he finally picked the man out, Munir taking the catch at cover off Knowles (2-39). When Chapman (2-42) bowled Storr soon after for one, the score was 95-4 and Cutthorpe were looking to finish strongly.

However, some excellent middle order hitting saw Quarndon race along during the last 15 overs.

Will Richardson made a quickfire 38 from just 21 balls and Charles Percival also made 33 in no time, and with the support of Dumelow (30) who was happy to just rotate the strike, Quarndon finished on 211-9. Butt and Savage both picked up late wickets to finish with 3-52 and 1-70 respectively.

Matt Cluer and Kev Leatherday opened the innings for Cutthorpe and were met with a hostile spell of bowling from young seamer Ahmad Zazai, and he was to get the early wicket of Cluer who feathered one behind for one. This brought Liam Sadler (7) to the crease and although he played some good shots, he was to go in similar fashion as Zazai found the edge and Lidsey took a good low catch at third slip to leave Cutthorpe 25-2.

Burdett joined Leatherday and the scoring rate started to move on. The score had progressed to 56 and the pair looked in no trouble when Owen Hughes (1-31) found the edge of Leatherday (27) and Rollins took the catch at first slip. However, it wasn’t long before the rain started to fall and the umpires took the players from the field to leave Burdett (22*) and Andy Thompson (7*) and Cutthorpe on 72-3 as no further play was possible.

Another unsatisfactory ending to a good game, the rain now denying Cutthorpe the chance for wins two weeks running, albeit with weather having an impact across most games, the ten points gained sees Cutthorpe one step closer to safety with only three games left to play. Next week Cutthorpe host Spondon, 12pm start.