HARPENDEN captain feels defeat may help team perform better at pre-season favourites

HARPENDEN skipper Ben Frazer believes last weekend’s defeat by Tring Park may help them as they head to pre-season favourites Welwyn Garden City this weekend.

Frazer hopes that the seven-wicket defeat to Tring will fire his side up for the local derby.

“They’re (Welwyn) flying at the moment and they’re a very good side,” said Frazer. “We’ve got to be a completely different side to the one we were today. They’re one of the best sides around, we’re not at that standard yet so we’ll just go out there and give it our all.

“In a way today’s result is perfect for then because I know there’s 10 other guys in the changing room who are desperate to put right today’s performance.”

The Harpenden skipper was disappointed to see his side bowled out for 120 and questioned whether his side was up for the challenge.

“Once we lost two in the first two balls, and two of our best batsmen, you’re always trying to pull it back from there which doesn’t really excuse us on that wicket getting bowled out for 120,” said Frazer.

“The difference from this week’s bowlers to last week’s, they bowled back of a length, one side of the wicket and I don’t know whether our boys were up for that challenge today which is a bit of a shame after last week.”

Director of cricket David Doyle felt Harpenden were on the back foot as soon as they lost two batsmen to the first two balls of the game and was disappointed that Harpenden didn’t build on the partnerships they built.

“I think as soon as you lose your best two players potentially in the first two balls of the game, it’s always going to put you on the back foot,” said Doyle.

“We were in a hole we had to climb out of and it was a hard climb and we didn’t quite make it.

“When we started to put partnerships together the guys got out at the wrong time and at this standard and in this division you just can’t do that.

“After last week when everything went well, the guys have got to take on some responsibility and start doing the job and building partnerships.”

Frazer also stated that the side shouldn’t be relying on opener Nick Lamb and overseas star Ben Clements to score all the runs.

“They’ve been exceptional so far – Clemmo (Clements) last week was one of the best innings you’ll see. We can’t just rely on them, there’s other in the team that are capable of batting and we can’t just rely on two boys to get us runs.”