North Enfield Cricket Club’s 1st XI earned a vital second win of the season in Division 3A of the Saracens Hertfordshire Cricket League, with the Sunday XI also strolling to a comfortable victory!
After being inserted by Potton Town on a damp, sticky wicket, the hosts initially struggled as a combination of some good bowling, a tricky pitch and questionable shot selection left them three down relatively early. However, Ishan Tilakaratna’s brief cameo (18) got the scoreboard moving, whilst Tom Coughlan held things together at the other end. Despite the fall of Tilakaratna, North Enfield continued to dig themselves out of a hole, as Coughlan continued to accumulate and moved past 50 with some beautiful ground strokes and impressive power hitting, ably supported by first Callum Mackay (14) and then Josh Jones (20). When Coughlan gloved through to the wicket keeper for a stunning 95 (9 fours and 4 sixes), the North Enfield innings was swiftly wrapped up, although the hosts’ 192 would make for a challenging chase on a sticky wicket.
From the start, North Enfield knew that the big wicket was the destructive Potton Town captain, who immediately demonstrated why by depositing two of Thomas Munt’s first three balls over the leg side boundary. Whilst he was at the crease the visitors were in command, but North Enfield were able to put some pressure on as first Mackay and then Coughlan removed the number one and three batters respectively. The crunch moment of the game came when the Potton captain skimmed a Coughlan delivery hard and flat to Tilakaratna at long off, swinging the pendulum in North Enfield’s favour. From then on, Coughlan and Steve Gandy dried up the runs and took a further three wickets, before Mackay and Tilakaratna finished the job with a further two wickets apiece, as the hosts defeated the side third in the table by 40 runs for a win that keeps their chances of survival alive.
Elsewhere, North Enfield’s Sunday XI strolled to an easy win over Hendricks by 105 runs as a brutal 150* from Chris Gillman and 39 from Zane Green helped them to 260 - 5, before wickets for William Munt (3) and Nick Munt (2), helped to bowl the visitors out for 155, with captain Freddie Pearson and Nick Munt both also taking stunning one-handed catches in an entertaining match.
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