Lowerhouse v East Lancs

Lowerhouse romped to their 1st home league victory of the season by easily seeing off the challenge of leaders East Lancs on Sunday afternoon.

The hosts batted first with Joe Martin promoted to opener in the absence of Ben Heap (suspended) and Jonny Whitehead (injured). He and Jack Edgar made a steady start to the innings and passed 50 inside 15 overs, picking off the opening bowlers with ease. A change of bowling, though, brought about some success for East Lancs. Martin was first to go for 24 when he succumbed to the bowling of Mark Bolton and in the very next over, Jon Finch mistimed a sweep and it spooned up to John Turner at leg slip. Edgar and Cobus Pienaar managed to carry on the good work until Edgar tripped up on 37. This didn’t deter Pienaar as he secured a 2nd half century in a row off 62 balls and eventually departed for 56. Matt Walker and Joe Hawke increased the tempo by attacking the bowlers with a 81 run partnership in only 11 overs with Hawke also passing 50 again off 47 balls. The two Bailey brothers picked up two vital boundaries to stop East Lancs gaining the bowling bonus points and take the final score to 245/9 off the 50 overs.

East Lancs started their response poorly and never recovered. Pienaar set the tone in his first over by getting rid of Mini Bhada who gave Walker a regulation catch without scoring. Finch continued to make inroads into the batting order by taking the wickets of Lord (4) and Riley, featuring some smart glovework from Joe Martin (1). The East Lancs professional Kleinveldt, who had earlier taken 6/78, tried to get the innings going but was stopped in his tracks on 22 by a Bailey combo when he punched it straight to Declan at mid off in Fergus’ spell of ever present tight bowling. Fergus also bowled stalwart John Turner (9) to finish with economical figures of 2/16 off his 8 overs. Joe Hawke came into the attack and didn’t show any signs of letting up by keeping it difficult for the visitors to get anywhere near their target. He also took 2 wickets to finish with figures of 2/15 off 7 overs. Just like last week, Paddy Martin and Walker combined to take the final 3 wickets as East Lancs were bowled out for 116 with 12 overs left. John Pearson top scored with 30 not out (Nick Turner also managed double figures with 14). An excellent all round bowling performance gave Lowerhouse victory by 129 runs.

MOM was Joe Hawke for his 51 & 2/15.

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