A pleasantly warm sunny day welcomed Kettering Town III to Compton Park. The game soon fell to the familar pattern of recent games, the opposition bat, their openers struggle against fine bowling (in this case Tony and Sid) but still compile a fifty plus partnership. Once the breakthrough was made, change bowlers Skipper Mark and James Goodwin applied the breaks on the scoring with two more wickets claimed. Unfortunately the earlier good work was undone when Kettering’s number 5 was dropped early in his innings and then went on to slay 94 runs in 11 overs in a partnership that could have easily been undone.
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The eventual total of 214 was always going to be challenging given that the Cooks were missing two of their regular middle order batsmen in Jack and Ben. Both Russ, then Adam departed starting a steady procession of batsmen with only Skipper Mark enduring. When Alfie joined the steadfast Skipper the score was 37 for 4 and this pair survived 8 overs with Alfie showing great determination with a plucky 5 runs. When the youngster was dismissed three wickets soon followed including the skipper for a defiant 41. Credit due to Kettering’s bowling attack which was both accurate and rotated to keep the batsmen guessing.
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The last three Cogenhoe batsmen, with a combined age of over 160 years, had there own ideas as to when the game was going to end. Dave Patrick with Sid and then partnering Tony Bird showed the batsmen how to conquer the opposition attack. They ensured that the innings ended only three runs short of the third batting bonus and a modicum of respectability achieved.
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Again the result did not tell the full story as the bowlers had little luck and the batting line-up lacked depth on this occasion. The spirit of the team was epitomised by the wagging of the veteran tail, showing that although relegation is becoming more of a reality it will not be for lack of effort or spirit in the team whoever is selected.