The first game of the Harefield 1st XI season coincided with the first game of Daniel Ogden’s tenure as first team captain. Ickenham won the toss on a slightly green but flat wicket and elected to bat first. This decision seemed an interesting one when second ball Jordan McLeod took the wicket of Ickenham captain Elliott Evans for 0. This brought Dan O’Driscoll to the crease and with that an immediate intent to put the pressure onto the Harefield bowlers. Good stroke making and some loose bowling helped Ickenham to a good second wicket partnership before spin was bought into the attack and skipper Ogden’s decision was almost immediately rewarded with Man of the match contender Croft trapping Ickenham’s opener LBW for 19. Spin was then brought on from the other end and again Harefield were rewarded with a slowing of the scoring rate leading to the wicket of Dan O’Driscoll caught well by Tom McLeod at slip again off the bowling of Croft. More tight bowling and some more brilliant catching by Tom McLeod lead to Ickenham falling to 176-8 having at one point been 115-2. A quick 74mph bumper from big game bowler Tom Marshall was the highlight of the last 10 overs from Harefield’s bowlers as some good hitting from Ickenham’s tail end especially Jack Hayward (70*) lead Ickenham to what seemed a challenging total of 239-8 after their 50 overs.
The total set by Ickenham looked even more challenging after the first over of our innings when Captain Ogden nicked an away shaper off the Ickenham opening bowler Mistry. This brought together the partnership of Croft and Matt Ogden. The start of this partnership was dominated by the Ickenham opening bowlers repeatedly overstepping. Croft took advantage of the multiple chances to hit free hits by launching Mistry a long way back over his head for a massive six. After Croft and Matt had punished the Ickenham quicks, Ickenham brought on spinner Owen Marshall onto bowl. Good rotation of strike and the odd boundary helped Croft and Matt to a second wicket partnership of 118 before Matt (46) was caught at deep cover. This brought Tom McLeod to the crease and this partnership carried on the theme of good rotation of strike and the occasional boundary before McLeod was runout for 31. By this point Harefield were well on their way to chasing the score with relative ease. Two more wickets fell alongside some big hitting before Croft brought up his brilliant maiden hundred with game already in the bag for the Hare’s. A few more boundaries from Croft (106*) and Hatton took Harefield over the winning line with still five overs to spare. Scorecard Link: harefield.play-cricket.com/website/results/4787454
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