ESCA Week 10 match reports
A pretty poor weekend for the Green and Blue, as all three sides record losses to kick off the second half of the season.
The Firsts made the trip along the M8 to Livingston and, having been put in, made a solid 193. Lawrence Dingre got things off to an explosive start, hitting 26 off 21 with a couple of sixes in there, and while the boys lost a couple of cheap wickets, Nithishraj Saravanan’s 31, a top-scoring 45 from Ajey Chaudhary and a valuable 15* from Andrew Bentley set a decent challenge for the hosts.
Unfortunately it was a story of too many extras and too many dropped chances with the ball. Ahmad Bilal’s opening 63 runs got Livingston off to an excellent start, and while the 1s made inroads, the hosts ended up with a 6 wicket win.
Meanwhile the Seconds were playing host to Livingston 3 at Meggetland, and were also batting having lost the toss. Things started badly for the 2s, with both openers being dismissed for 1. Luckily Irfan Mohammed and Hari Seeba were able to steady things, scoring 32 and 14 respectively. Hassan Durrani also chipped in with an unbeaten 27, but star of the batting was Pete “Connoly” Connolly, whose excellent counter-attacking innings saw him score his maiden 50 for the club, eventually falling for 53.
The total of 197 looked defendable, and a piece of quick thinking in the field from Hari to run out Livvie’s opener off a no-ball got the 2s off to a great start. At drinks Livvie needed 115 from 20 overs, but some excellent batting from the visiting middle order, along with some loose fielding got Livingston back into it, and they finished the chase in the 39th over. Still bottom of the table, but some more promising signs for the Seconds.
That left the Third XI, playing a home tie at Winchburgh due to unavailability of pitches, as the last chance of a win this weekend. Given call-offs elsewhere in the club, it was something of an achievement to get a side out at all, and it was always going to be a challenge against the current league leaders. It was something of an achievement to restrict Winchburgh to 167 for the loss of 9 wickets. All the bowlers chipped in, but the pick was Matthew Batchelor, who picked up 3 for 31. The reply got off to a shaky start, with two of the top three making ducks. Tom Jepson batted exceptionally patiently at number 4, but the pick of the batting was an excellent stand of 80 between Shamir Khan (35) and Hassan Rizwan, with Hassan eventually reaching his 50 in the final over. While it wasn’t a win, picking up 8 bonus points was, in the circumstances, something of an achievement.