The 1st XI hosted Great Houghton on Saturday. With decent weather throughout the week, Horton won the toss and elected to bat on a flat surface. Aside from a few loose balls, which Karan Parmar dispatched to the boundary, Great Houghton’s openers largely put the ball in the right areas. They were rewarded with the wickets of Parmar (21) and Monkman (6), who fell in quick succession. Brayden Hill was at the crease and looking comfortable, unfortunately he didn’t get much support with Horton’s middle order collapsing through some poor batting to leave them 87-5. Fin Moffat (44), for the second week running, provided support for Hill, who continued to bat superbly – managing the field and the game situation. When Moffat was caught on the rope, Brayden went into attack mode. With one over left to spare, Brayden brought up his first Horton ton, finishing on 102* - a superb hundred, showing a high level of game IQ, toughness and maturity. Horton closing on a competitive 229-8.

In reply, Great Houghton had to negotiate the opening duo of Ben Meachem (1-26) and Kalpesh Chandracant (1-20). Big Ben got up some sharp pace and had the opener caught behind, from a bouncer. Kally followed with the dismissal of the other opener to leave Houghton 34-2. The Great Houghton overseas, James Watson, batted well with their number four and it was 125 before the number four was caught off the bowling of Parmar (3-79). Watson then went into overdrive, manipulating the field and taking risks. Despite wickets for Finch (1-45) and Smith (1-21), Great Houghton took control of the chase. Watson did finally fall for an outstanding 117, but the damage was done and Great Houghton got the final few runs to pull off an improbable victory, with one over to spare.

2nd XI vs. Wellingborough Town CC 2nd XI

Week 4 took the 2nd XI on the road to Wellingborough Town, where once again we lost the toss and were asked to bat in overcast conditions.

J.Maw (9) and A.Adhikari (68) opened the batting and saw out the first 10 overs comfortably until their partnership ended with the loss of Joe at 32/1. Z.Mirza (22) and H.Cooke (11) provided good support to Akshat who had his eye in, finding the gaps with ease and kept the scoreboard ticking along nicely. Akshat fell to a good ball off Wellingborough’s veteran spinner with the score on 113/3 in the 34th over. At this stage of our innings, we looked set on capitalising with the wickets we had in hand press on with a higher run rate. Unfortunately, as with the case from the start, Wellingborough Town kept to their very tight line of bowling and continued to strangle the runs. Our batsmen tried to score by taking some risks which didn’t pay off and we ended our innings for 154 all out.

Feeling 25 runs short, but backing our explosive bowling attack, we still felt like we were in the game. T.Devadasan (4-22) took his first scalp trapping the Wellingborough opener in front in his first over. F.Herrington (1-33) took the next wicket with an excellent diving catch by Harvey Cooke at short cover. N.Kakkar (2-18) added two more wickets just before the drinks break and the match was evenly poised with he hosts at 68/4. Wellingborough consolidated well adding 60 runs for their 5th wicket partnership before B.Parker (1-14) got the breakthrough, Harvey Cooke with another great catch on the offside boundary. Re-enter Thanush Devadasan striking instantly in his first over back and suddenly we had two new batsmen at the crease. Another two dismissals in Thanush’s following over and the mood around the ground had suddenly become tense. Wellingborough still required 11 runs for victory with two wickets in hand and 7 overs remaining. With continued tight bowling and great ground fielding, Wellingborough found it very difficult to get the ball away freely. Alas, with 10 balls remaining the hosts hit the winning boundary and another tight game slipped through our fingertips.

3rd XI vs. Bold Dragoon CC 2nd XI

After much cogitation and even more hard work from various people working on the ground we were finally able to take to the field at Horton’s new pitch for the first time. Christened the Bozeatdrome by the Chairman we were able to celebrate with a victory due to some superb individual performances and an even better team ethic.
Having lost the toss we were put into bat on a tacky surface with the ball not really coming onto the bat. After an early wicket Alex Hearn signalled his intent with a lovely straight 6; when he fell to a smart catch behind, followed soon after by Darpan, Horton were 39-3 and the loss of the toss was looking to be the key factor. To the crease then appeared Amos, who had already done a round-trip to Heathrow that morning (next time he will be sent to Gatwick for his warm-up). With Fred supporting at the other end Amos started to accelerate, with some brilliant pull shots. When Amos finally fell on 81 there had been a partnership of nearly a hundred. The innings closed on 140 with Fred “Araldite” Jeyes carrying his bat, a great effort.

With the pitch drying out a little, 140 was possibly a gettable target. Kev and Alex opened and managed to keep the runs down, with Kev, as ever, taking the opening wicket. This brought in Dragoon’s gun batsman (Haque), who only seemed to want to hit 6s so as to avoid the long grass in the outfield. At 90-1 Dragoon were in the driving seat. Step up Ian Street who saw to it that Haque’s luck ran out when Alex took a brilliant catch on the boundary. The door was open and it was then up to the spin twins of Streety (5-34) and (Special K)atie (4-7) to close out the game, taking the next 8 wickets between them for only 15 runs. Exceptional bowling. Another great team performance and a super way to start life

4th XI vs. Burton Latimer CC 4th XI

The 4th team Legends took on Burton Latimer away and winning the toss we were in confident mood to set a target and decided to bat on a very good wicket. Jeremy Jesu was once again in fine form holding the innings together before he got out in the 21st over. By that time we had lost three wickets and the score was 63 but Chris Thomas and Adam Willis both started putting on the runs until they both got out to some good catches. Adam was particularly unlucky as he was out to probably the best catch of the season. A final flurry by Sateesh and Harry Farbourne got Horton to 150 for 8.

In reply Burton were kept tied down by Alfie Richardson and Harry. Harry taking a wicket with his first ball. The “worm” was pretty much level until the first change but then Burton tried to accelerate - up then steps Adam Willis who by taking 3 quick wickets sorted Burton’s progress. With the run rate still ahead of Horton’s Harry came back into the attack and with 3 wickets in the spell brought us back into the game. Burton needed 12 runs and had one wicket in hand and by the finest of margins crossed the line.

It was a game of close calls and some excellent performance from everyone in the team. Alfie Richardson deserves a massive shout out for soaking up all the pressure of the final over - the Richardson cricket genes are strong. Chris Archer kept us in the game with is excellent keeping. Lots to learn and work on as the season progresses!!

Ladies XI vs. Overstone Park CC Ladies XI

Another beautiful evening but this time with our hosts at Overstone. This week Nicky and Becky S stepped up to open the batting and what a tremendous effort. I noted an offside shot played in the very first over this week-massive progress. This partnership put on more than 50 runs and Kathryn came in number 3 to keep the run pressure on as the batters took the total to over 3 figures.

We now needed to keep the bowling and fielding tight. Mia and Cassidy delivered a confident opening bowling spell and our first catch in the gloves was taken by Lucy. Glad the sliding fielding stop from Becky H was not done on our square! But it did the job perfectly and no doubt prevented a boundary. Kudos to Jen for bowling the last over - absorbed the pressure and brought it home for us! Our hosts at Overstone are a pleasure to play against and while our first match victory was secured - a great atmosphere was delivered by both sides. Play of the Day tied this week for Becky H and Lucy. Thank you to James for umpiring and Rob for scoring.