Cricket: A team effort sees Middleton thirds home

Middleton Cricket Club

Middleton's third XI travelled to Walsden’s Scott Street ground looking to build on last weekends victory. Walsden won the toss and elected to bat with Addison Holland and Aaron Eaves opening the bowling for Middleton, both bowing a tight opening spell with no runs coming off the bat in the first four overs.

The first bowling change saw Stefan Holmes come into the attack to replace Holland. He soon got Middleton on the board having Aaron Lord comfortably caught by Hussain Shahid without scoring. Holmes continued through his allotted overs in one spell finishing with figures of 8(o)-2(m)-14(r)-2(w) his second wicket seeing him bowl Chris Lord for 22.

Replacing Holmes was 15-year-old Jack Nolan who made an immediate impact with two wickets from his first two balls, firstly removing Leon Bailey thanks to a smartly taken catch by skipper Mark Tierney, followed by James Staroszcuk LBW not offering a shot.

After drinks with Walsden on 109-4 and the experienced Jonathon Lord at the crease Middleton's young bowlers needed to live up to their promise to keep the score under 200, and they didn’t fail to deliver, restricting Walsden to 159-7. James Tierney and Addison Holland weighed in with the final three wickets, Tierney removing the stumps of both Jonathon Lord and Chris Ross whilst Holland had Jack Halstead caught behind by Liam Jackson.

Middleton's innings got off to a good start with Darren Brown and James Tierney punishing anything short of a length to rapidly move to 49 before Tierney was caught on the short boundary for a quickfire 32. Next in was Hussain Shahid who was soon off the mark with a sweetly timed four but was back in the shed soon afterwards lbw without further troubling the scorers.

Middleton lost their third wicket when Brown went for 25, leaving them on 67-3. After losing three wickets for 18 runs Middleton needed a good partnership to relieve the pressure. Stefan Holmes and Addison Holland combined at the crease with both playing sensibly to put on a partnership of 49 before Holmes fell, clean bowled by 12yr old Jack Halstead with Holland going the same way to the same bowler shortly afterwards. At this point with Middleton 121-5 and still needing 39 for a victory with plenty of overs left the two new batters at the crease, Aaron Eaves and Zain Ul Ahdin were both making their senior debuts with the bat.

The pair took Middleton to within two runs of victory before Eaves was bowled for a well played 21. Next to in to join Ul Ahdin, who had played patiently for his eight not out was Callum Brown who saw Middleton over the finishing line by dispatching a full toss to the boundary and for the second week running Middleton's 3rdXI gained four points with more than 10 overs to spare.

Middleton CC would like to thank Walsden CC, umpires Nigel Tench and Pete Bartrum and most importantly scorers Emilie Gale and Linzi Hughes.

Next up for the thirds are Glodwick CC who have also won their opening two fixtures.