Division Three London Colney 202-8 (53) *Cavendish 203-7 (43.3) LONDON Colney s defeat on Saturday against high-flying Cavendish will be remembered for all the wrong reasons. The match should have been memorable for some excellent competitive cricket

Division Three

London Colney 202-8 (53) *Cavendish 203-7 (43.3)

LONDON Colney's defeat on Saturday against high-flying Cavendish will be remembered for all the wrong reasons.

The match should have been memorable for some excellent competitive cricket from both sides, but Colney were left ruing a quite extraordinary incident near the end which ultimately made anything else that happened almost meaningless.

Batting first after losing the toss, Colney's innings ebbed and flowed in an absorbing manner.

The pitch had been freshened up after heavy rain early in the morning, and was drying in patches, giving a very two-paced nature.

After losing a wicket early, Colney then established a sound base with a 52 run partnership between Matt Bristow (40) and David Goff (32) for the second wicket. When Cavendish switched to the slow bowlers, Colney's innings lost its way completely, and between the 20th and 40th overs they were only able to add 55 runs for the loss of five wickets.

With six overs to go Colney stood at 135-6, and looked to have little chance of posting a competitive total, but Tim Fretter wrenched the game back to Colney with a ferocious 59, mostly scored in the last few overs, as Colney reached 202-8 in their 53 overs.

Given the nature of the pitch it looked a competitive total, and the Cavendish reply was just as absorbing and fluctuating.

Nick Hurst (15) blazed briefly at the top of the order but was bowled by skipper Bristow. Bryceland (36), Alwis (2) and Sangeewa (40) in the middle order all kept Cavendish on track, and, critically, up with the run rate.

Colney stayed in it thanks to three wickets from Uzman Zaman, and one each from David Goff and the Fretters, and with 25 needed and seven wickets down, Cavendish's hopes were largely resting on the second Alwis.

The game seemed to have swung to Colney when they thought they had Alwis comfortably run out by two metres only for the umpire to be completely uninterested. From that point on, as Colney fell apart, the game went swiftly to its conclusion, and Cavendish won with three overs. The final stages went with Colney's desire and enjoyment visibly shattered. A Colney player said: "Like a number of other clubs, we have some dedicated and able cricketers who are thinking of giving up league cricket as they have no wish to give up a Saturday only to have it ruined by this sort of thing, which is happening too often. Something clearly has to be done."

London Colney II lost on the road to Southgate Adelaide II in Division Seven.

After being inserted Colney posted 238-5 with runs from Connor Dow (59) and Trevor Ray (70), and contributions from everyone else. In reply, Adelaide got home with three wickets and one ball to spare on 241-7.