PLAY STOPS RAIN

As often happens in this part of the world, rain fell steadily for almost an hour prior to the scheduled start time and then incredibly stopped right on cue. Our hosts decided conditions were good enough and in a trice Les had won the toss and opted to bat – a thoroughly reasonable decision given that conditions weren't great and could only deteriorate.

The exciting opening pairing of Dave and Geoff was designed to get outcasts off to a good start and though both played some nice strokes it was clear the wicket was going to be a major influence in the outcome of the game. After one or two that had jumped up at his throat Dave perished to a straight one that kept low while Geoff miscued a cut shot for a catch at point.

Very decent bowling by Croney and Fullilove made for deathly slow scoring and it was a shock to see Paul pull one to the rope at deep fine leg, the only boundary of the innings. Soon after Tony got caught plum lbw by another one that didn't bounce, while Paul's hopeful mid-air sweep skied its way into the wheeling keeper's gloves.

Les saw the ball well enough and made some good connections but a misjudged decision to thwack one into the River Wye ended up with his stumps sadly splayed. Ted and Colin saw out the innings with stoic resistance, though it remained nigh on impossible to get the ball away.

Outcasts finished on 57, which on this particular wicket looked like a target that might just be defendable, though considerably below the 80 or so that might have given Peak Park the collywobbles.

Les opened the bowling for Outcasts and in his opening over put down a stunner that nipped back to take the top of off to remove Kelly for a duck. Game on!

As expected Peak Park struggled to score but looked more settled on a wicket they know well and that didn't seem to be misbehaving quite so much. Incredibly the rain laden skies never delivered on their threat and so the only way to victory for Outcasts would be to bowl out the opposition. 

When Jones lofted one of Geoff's deliveries down throat for a magnificent catch by Bob Sproat at mid-on, victory became a less feint hope with Peak Park now 23 for 2 off 9. But then the unorthodox Coombes dug in, never scoring profusely while not appearing to be in too much bother either.

The occasional boundary and an uncharacteristic bevvy of wides kept Park just ahead of the pace with wickets to spare. After a number of fairly uneventful overs from Paul and Derek, Andy livened things up causing Shepherd to mistime his drive into Colin's unerring buckets at short mid-off.

Park eased past Outcasts total in the nineteenth over, though the competition had effectively ended a good few overs earlier.

On the positive side we were lucky to dodge the weather to complete this game, and once again Outcasts' performance in the field was excellent and the spirit first rate.

If only we could get some runs  ......  any runs …. from anywhere .....