posted 14th June 2021
If the cricket ended in disappointment, given the magnificent weather. this was still an afternoon to savour and most importantly a toss to win. Usually with this heat, batting first can be worth a 50-run start and so it proved. Although gifting Minster 36 in extras was too generous a gesture on our part. We bowled steadily on an easy paced wicket, it's usually spin in these conditions and Alex Dawson's off-spin, 4 wickets in 17 overs stood out here.
Some gorgeous batting between Robert and Pat, the most fluent of partnerships. A pleasure to watch and it kept us in touch. But when Robert was out, the talented middle order didn't fire and we lost 5 wickets for 23 runs.
Then the sensible way was not to go gung-ho and gift our opposition the points and we comfortably avoided that.
The win-lose-draw makes captaincy difficult, declare at 50 overs? Minster should have. They were 225 by this stage, that would have been competitive and given the game an extra 6 overs to get a result either way. However, I don't blame their captain for being cautious, what would I have done given the same situation, I guess probably the same (reluctantly!) .