Howzat...

Cricket season gets underway

LOUGHBOROUGH Town travelled to face defending champions Kibworth on the opening weekend of the new Leicestershire and Rutland Cricket League season.

Loughborough won the toss and decided to bowl first. Loose bowling from the openers saw Kibworth score 98 runs in just 11 overs without losing a wicket. From then on Loughborough changed the flow of the match with tight bowling from Ben Mike and Nil Patel.

Mike dismissed Sunny Patel for 34, and followed it up with the wicket of Craven for 82 caught at mid-off by Kyle Saddington. The two quick wickets brought Aadil Ali and Van Biljon to the crease but they were unable to score as freely as they would like and Loughborough closed out the innings well with tight bowling and exception fielding.

Kyle Saddington picked up four wickets towards the end of the innings to finish with 4-51 as Kibworth finished with a score of 265 for 8.

Loughborough started their innings well, reaching 53-0 after 10 overs as both Anish Patel and Shyam Patel scored freely from the Kibworth seamers, before Shyam Patel was dismissed by Russell Spiers, LBW for 26.

From then on in, KibworthssSpin attack proved to be very difficult on a slow, low wicket and they slowed the scoring rate down which saw Loughborough 110-2 at the halfway point. Just after the drinks break Anish Patel brought up his half century, but was then dismissed, bowled by Darren Shaw for 54.

From then on the Loughborough batting order collapsed and wickets fell frequently leaving Loughborough at 128-7 and it took all of the experience of Kyle Saddington and Nil Patel to stop the fall of wickets as they looked to block out the rest of the innings.

They did so with some success until Nil Patel was dismissed in the penultimate over for 8. Kyle Saddington saw the last over through and finished on 33 not out as Loughborough closed on 164 for 8 for a losing draw.

• On Sunday, Loughborough were knocked out of the National Knockout Cup after an away defeat at Walmley. For a full report visit loughboroughecho.net

Anish Patel hit 54 for Loughborough Town as they drew their season opener against Kibworth.