Weekend double for the Greens
HAWK Green travelled to Dinting on Saturday and on winning the toss the Greens skipper Josh Unsworth elected to bat first with Paul Needham and Justin Blackhurst opening the innings against Dintings opening attack of Ryan Stringer and Danny Brightmore.
With the brilliant weather experienced over the past few weeks the wicket was, as expected, fast and bouncy with something for both bowlers and batsmen alike.
It was Stringer who struck first, having Blackhurst caught behind for 9, 21-1. Skipper Unsworth was next to the crease and both batsmen struggled against the accurate bowling of Brightmore.
Ryan Stringer was replaced by Rudolph Liebenberg who struck early in his spell, having Unsworth caught off a leading edge by Mark Stringer for 15, 47-2. Inform Ben Littler failed for once and fell LBW to Brightmore for a duck, 47-3.
All this time Paul Needham was struggling to find his form and eventually fell, adjudged LBW, to Harwick for 30, 106-4.
Jack Needham introduced a little more urgency in to the run rate until he was caught in the deep by Chris Wyche off the bowling of Harwick for 39, 117-6.
Josh Hampson and Jordan Henderson were the first batsmen to come to terms with the situation and a partnership of 67 in quick time was eventually broken when Henderson was caught by Brightmore, bowled Damian Stringer for 40, 184-6.
Hampson fell shortly after for 25 and with the tally on 186-7 it was Sam Clarke and Logan Jeffs who took the total to a respectable 259-7 with Jeffs being the main perpetrator, finishing on 49 not out off 23 balls including 23 off the last over. Clarke finished on 10 not out.
Dinting’s openers Greg Harwick and Matt Parker started very steadily against the Greens opening attack of Josh Unsworth and Lee Hallas and it was the latter who struck first, bowling Parker for 13, 31-1. Then the same bowler accounted for Harwick for 33 caught and bowled, 52-2.
This brought Tom Wyche and skipper Martin Knight together and they started to rebuild the reply with Wyche being the more aggressive until he eventually fell, bowled by Jordan Henderson for 41, 114-3. Brother Chris fell immediately, LBW to the same bowler, for five 124-4.
This brought Damian Stringer to the crease and whilst Knight was still striving to keep the board ticking over, Stringer was struggling to assist him. When Knight eventually fell for 41, a splendid catch by Hallas off the bowling of Mark Richards, 160-5, Danny Brightmore was the next and last Dinting batsman to the crease.
The score was 188-5 and 72 required for victory – not a great ask at Dinting.
Unsworth brought himself and Hallas back into the attack.
Brightmore tried to take the attack to the Green but during this spell of fine bowling he did not face enough balls, so much so that when the last over arrived Dinting still needed 54 for victory and they eventually fell 42 short 218-7.
Hallas was the Green’s most successful bowler with an excellent spell of 11 overs 2-33.
Green’s 2nd Xl had a fine victory at New Mills and fittingly Tom Chetwyn, who was originally selected for the first team but volunteered to make way for the return of Josh Hampson, helped secure the victory with 58 in their innings assisted by Chris Head with 101, and then took eight wickets to secure victory.
On the Sunday the Green travelled to local rivals Compstall for the semi-final of the Bissenden Cup and after yet again winning the toss, skipper Unsworth elected to bat.
Apart from a blip early on it was business as usual for the Greens batsmen, led at first by teenager Jack Needham, 57, and latterly by Peter Richards, 53.
A late rush from Andrew Bickley took the total at the end of the allotted overs to 246-8.
The contest was all but over when Compstall lost their two openers, Messih and Bailey, both falling with the total on 13.
Dylan Heginbotham and Mark Gossnel tried valiantly to retrieve the situation but when the latter was comically run out for 40 the writing was on the wall and the response ended on 135.
The pick of the bowlers were Henderson 3-28 and Ridings 3-31.
The Green are at home next Saturday to Woodley.