A DISMAL weekend for London Colney saw the firsts lose at home to Totteridge-Millhilians II. The visitors won the toss and elected to bat, and produced a rather unusual first innings

Division Three

Totteridge Millhillians II 197 all out (38) London Colney 120 all out (42)

A DISMAL weekend for London Colney saw the firsts lose at home to Totteridge-Millhilians II.

The visitors won the toss and elected to bat, and produced a rather unusual first innings going for shots from the off. The second 10 overs of the innings produced 83 runs, while three wickets fell, and that was pretty much the pattern of the whole innings. With the batsmen going for their shots, there was always a chance that wickets would fall, and David Goff was the chief beneficiary, taking 5-83 in his best spell of the season, backed up by Uzman Zaman, who claimed 3-45. Any batsman who managed to stay for any time was going to post a big score, and the pick of TM batsmen was Ahmed Zia, who hit an excellent 99, as the visitors posted 197 all out in just 97 overs.

Although they would have fancied that as a gettable target, Colney got off to the worst possible start, as two lbws and a needless run our went against them in the opening overs, and three wickets had fallen before 40 runs were on the board.

Alex McCartney rallied with an attacking 28, and there was a brief period of resistance as skipper Matt Bristow (36) and Tim Fretter added 35 for the seventh wicket, but the momentum was always with the TM bowlers.

In the end, despite some controversial umpiring decisions, which to be fair went against both sides, Colney would have to admit that Totteridge Millhillians bowled better than they batted on the day. The hosts subsided to 120 all out to lose by 77 runs.

London Colney II failed to deliver with the bat as they were comprehensively beaten by hosts Tewin in Division Seven.

Skipper Paul Seymour won the toss but the Colney batsmen, with the notable exception of Mitch Bradley, failed again to step up to the mark.

Tewin's opening attack of Williams (4-28) and Heather (4-40) were simply too and wickets fell steadily all around Bradley, as he stood alone, batting superbly to score 71. Bradley survived a scare when he was out of his ground and the wicket keeper was ruled not to have broken the stumps cleanly. But for that, Colney would probably have been out for less that 50, and as it was, they could only stumble to 113, with Den Hadley (18) the only other batsman to reach double figures.

It was never a defendable score, but once Colney's openers, Simon Fretter and Connor Dow, who both bowled well, had been seen off, the change bowlers were out to the sword. Taylor bludgeoned an unbeaten 67, and, backed up by an increasingly confident Vacani (26 not out), the home side reached 114 without losing a wicket in just 24 overs, leaving Colney pointless from probably the heaviest defeat of recent years.