Stenhouse rips through Macc
ON Saturday Macclesfield 1st XI travelled to the Wirral to face Oxton where the home side earned a comfortable victory.
Having lost the toss, captain Rob Porter led his team out alongside Justin Galeotti.
The latter proceeded to smash the first ball of the fixture for a boundary as the visitors appeared positive in the early stages.
This was until Porter was bowled for four, bringing Khalid Sawas to the crease.
At the other end, Galeotti scored multiple boundaries to carry on the quick start.
However, when Chris Stenhouse returned to bowl at 29-1 a big change in the match would occur.
Stenhouse bowled Sawas for 1 before completing his hat-trick by taking two more wickets in successive deliveries. 29-1 soon became 29-5 when Galeotti fell to Harris for a positively made 24.
Some resistance was shown from Cross and Birchall but offered very little in posting a competitive score as Macclesfield continued to lose wickets and eventually were bowled out for just 59. (Stenhouse 6-27 Harris 3-30)
As the teams turned straight around and Oxton came out to chase down the Macclesfield total, home team captain Jack Smith opened with Jonny Crick.
The opening pair looked to bat sensibly and score where they could against Ward and Palmes of Macclesfield.
Offering very few chances, Smith and Crick progressed scoring a number of boundaries and were able to chase down the total quickly.
Both finished 29 not out the Oxton batting pair took their side to the 25 points.
After a disappointing day for the 1st XI, Macclesfield host Toft in the Twenty20 competition of Thursday before welcoming Bowdon on Saturday in the league.
Elsewhere, the Macclesfield 2nd XI welcomed Oxton to Victoria Road. The visitors won the toss and elected to bowl.
Macclesfield started
steadily through Coombes and Isherwood taking up a number of balls to get the home side off to a steady start.
When Coombes was caught, it brought Angus Thompson to the crease, one of a few on half term break from playing school cricket.
Thompson was soon joined by fellow Kings player Sam Buckingham and the pair started to form a decent scoring partnership.
A run of solid support from Buckingham and then Alex Griffiths to Thompson meant that the score could really progress taking it past the 100 mark before Angus was dismissed for an excellently made 78.
The lower order managed to take the score to a defendable first innings total of 205-9 including a useful 24 from Tom Radley.
After the break, Oxton set about chasing down the Macclesfield total through Kinsey and Mitchell who batted well but were not scoring too positively.
Radley was able to make the breakthrough when he bowled Mitchell.
Oxton continued to play steadily, avoiding risks against accurate bowling. Barney Cutbill did however make the breakthrough when he had Kinsey bowled and had a further two LBW decisions in the innings.
The visitors continued to fall behind the scoring rate.
A wicket each for Whittingham and Cutbill dismissed Gauntlett and Kumar both whilst the score was just 63- 6 leaving Oxton in a lot of trouble.
From here however the visitors dug in and batted to avoid losing their final 4 wickets.
A hungry Macclesfield bowling attack worked very hard to try and take these wickets but a couple of dropped catches proved to be critical.
Tom Radley took his second wicket of the day to remove Fraser for 42 but the Oxton tail did enough to avoid the loss as the visitors finished on 130-7 off their 50 overs.
The 2nd XI took 14 points from the fixture but look to follow up their strong start to the season as they travel to Bowdon next weekend.
The 3rd XI travelled to Timperley 3s and drew falling six runs short of the home sides total of 223-8. Mentions for Josh Rajendrum (2 wickets and 20 not out) Joe Haigh (60) and Ben Winrow (30 not out).
The 4th XI lost at Bowden, falling two runs short. Starring performances from Henry Mitchell (5 wickets) Harry Owens (44) and Nick Moss (45).