Burton Leonard 1st XI v Darley

Having won their first two opening games, Burton Leonard lost their first game of the season to Darley. Given all the heavy rain during the week the visit to Darley was always going to be difficult as the wicket is usally very soft and difficult for batting and yesterday proved no exception as conditions were wetter than normal.

The Burton skipper for the day, Michael Wray was very relieved when Darley elected to bat first having won the toss. The Darley innings started very slowly and the Burton Leonard bowlers quickly found their line and length but it was not until the introduction of Dan Thirkell, playing his first game of the year after a winter playing football with Harrogate Railway that wickets began to fall and at 69-4 after 25 overs, Darley looked to be in a bit of trouble. However thanks to the experience of Paul Pattison and the straight hitting of Lee Platts, Darley began to build a competitive total and at the tea interval had posted a very good total of 185-8 with Thirkell finishing with 6-47.

The Burton Leonard innings began badly when Ben Drummond misjudged a ball outside off stump and gave mid off an easy catch. Mike Stansfield then began building a partnership with Michael Wray taking the score passed 50 before he was undone by peculiarities of the Darley pitch something which was to become a theme of the Burton innings as batsmen came and went without really getting to grips with the wicket.

Meanwhile Michael Wray was busy building an innings at the other end and passed fifity for the first time this season before deciding that attack was the best form of defense given the conditions, and the watching crowd were treated to some uncultured strokes from a batsmen usually more known for his cover drives.

When Wray was finally dismissed for a well earned 65, the writing was on the wall for Burton and although there was some good late order defiance from Joe Wilson and Rob Murray, the innings closed on 139 in the forty second over.

Burton Leonard play Bishop Thornton, one of last years division one relagated teams at home next week and will be hoping to bounce straight back.

The Gallery

This entry was posted on Sunday May 4th, 2008 at 12:38 PM and is filed under Sport. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response.

Leave a Reply

Name (required)
Mail (required - will not be published)
Website


Security Code