Warwickshire & West Midlands Sport

Duo bowl Village into next round

EXCELLENT bowling from Greg Kilroy and James Flynn helped Knowle Village progress to the third round of the npower Village Cup in what is their first season in the competition.
Knowle were handed a bye in the first round and will now face the winners of the clash between Cropston and Jollysailor in the third round on May 23 after winning by 116 runs at Bitteswell on Sunday.
Bitteswell, who play their league cricket in Leicestershire League Division Two, decided to field first after winning the toss and they made an early breakthrough when Martyn Holmes fended a rising ball to slip.
Knowle batted patiently in order to try and keep wickets in hand and were 70-2 at the halfway stage having lost Neil Turner for 7 to a superb catch from wicket-keeper Underwood.
Two further wickets fell before Matt McCarthy (80) and Joe Jarma (54) came together to increase the scoring rate and help push the final total to 201-7.
In reply, Bitteswell were in early trouble as Kilroy (4-13) tore through the top order, ably supported by Chris Langford, who was unlucky not to get amongst the wickets.
The introduction of Scott Langford gave Bitteswell some brief respite before Kevin Dand was acrobatically caught by Dan Bates off the bowling of Langford.
When Flynn (4-25) came on it signalled the beginning of the end for Bitteswell as he cleaned up the tail. Bitteswell were bowled out in the 23rd over for just 85 and only some lower order hitting from Edwards (26) prevented Knowle finishing the game even quicker.
SATURDAY saw the 1sts and 3rds’ games wiped out without a ball being bowled so the 2nds took centre stage in their clash against Massey Ferguson.
Persistent drizzle greeted Knowle’s arrival in Coventry and it looked for a long time as the trip may well have been in vain.
However, with an early tea taken, the drizzle relented and a 30 over contest was agreed before the rain returned to reduce it to a 27 over per side match.
Massey, who had been put in by Knowle, set off at a blistering rate, racing to 54-0 off just four overs.
The high scoring rate continued until the introduction of Kevin Perfect (3-23) and Ali Gemmill (3-42).
The fall of wickets, including Akeel Ahmed for a belligerent 50, stemmed the scoring rate and Knowle took two further wickets including a superb run out by Denys Mulvihill to leave Massey on 169-8 from their 27 overs.
In reply, Knowle lost Martin Collard (3) early on and were always behind the rate despite the best efforts of Mark Alderson (32) and Jon McLeod (43).
Having realised they were going to fall short of the target of 170, Knowle set their sights on the losing draw total of 127, 75 per cent of Massey’s total and worth an additional two points.
Despite losing further wickets in pursuit of this revised target, Dave Clark (11no) and Ali Gemmill got Knowle to within reach of 127 and it was left to Gemmill to hit a boundary of the final ball of the game in fading light to finish on 127-7.
Saturday sees the 1sts travel to Coventry to face Standard while the 2nds entertain Pak Shaheen at Hampton Road. The 3rds make the short trip to face Coleshill 3rds.

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