Braywood make confident start to Chilterns campaign
Braywood made a confident start to their Chilterns Championship campaign with a nine wicket win over Ley Hill.
Visitors Ley Hill won the toss and elected to bat, but their total of 204-9 from 45 overs was just a little shy of par given the conditions and opposition.
Ben Moultrie-Ford scored well for his 42, as did Jack Thompson (48) and Iain Stewart (46) further down the order but Braywood bowled tightly, with Mohammed Ansar taking 3-49.
Braywood's response was dominated by the bat of Nasser Satti who struck 102 not out with
Nasir Mehmood playing well alongside him for his 63.
In the Chilterns Premiership, Pinkneys Green and Littlewick Green began their season with a local derby, with home side Pinkneys emerging victorious by seven runs in a thrilling contest.
Having been put into bat, Pinkneys managed to reach 226-9 from their 45 overs, with runs being scored throughout the order. At 140-7 hopes of a competitive score looked bleak but Praveen Sabba's 45 not out eased them beyond the 200 mark and he was ably supported late on by Teginder Kaleka (23). Banaby Hogg (4-35) kept Littlewick Green in the hunt and they'd have been confident of chasing at the turnaround, given the improving conditions.
That they didn't manage it says a lot for the performance of Chandu Sekar Bandla who took 5-49 to put the brakes on their chase. Christie Green smashed 83 and Hogg 73 to seemingly put the visitors on the brink of victory, but the lower order were hemmed in and just couldn't score runs quickly enough. Eventually they ran out of overs finishing seven runs short of their target in this win/loss format game despite having five wickets in hand.
Sadly, it was a case of Deja vu at Shephards Lane as Hurley got their Chilterns Premiership campaign underway with a disappointing 10 wicket defeat to Denham. The home side soon found themselves at 11-2, with both openers falling to Faisal Mahmood. Kennedy Newbert (3-5 from nine overs) and Simar Bhatia (5-26) made scoring difficult, and the pressure told as Singh went for an expansive drive and lost his middle stump to Newbert.
Walton was resolute, but none of his teammates could match this as Hurley were bowled out for 58 with only two partnerships reaching double figures.
Despite a tight half a dozen overs from Hurley's bowlers Harpreet and Kayani, which only yielded 13 runs, they were unable to force a breakthrough and Denham eased to victory. Ricky Butt (40no) rode his luck on occasion and Lupton (14no) provided the ideal foil as the visitors reached their target in the 13th over.
In Chilterns League Division 1, Holyport have raced to the top of the fledgling league standings after beating Winchmore Hill by nine wickets. Chasing Winchmore's 167 all out, they reached 172 for the loss of just one wicket in 22.3 overs. Ghulam Mirza hit 88 not out, and Suvojyoti Datta 56 as Holyport charged to victory.
In the same division, Little Marlow won their opening game against Denham 2nds by six wickets. In a low scoring match, Denham were bowled out for 136 with Usman Islam and Dinesh Reddy both taking 3-9. Anwar Mahmood then anchored the hosts to victory, opening and closing the innings with 60 not out as his side finished on 138-4.