Drayton v Sprowston 'A' 30th June 2008

Drayton 209-5 Sprowston 'A' 210-8 Drayton's first team suffered defeat at the hands of Sprowston 'A' on Saturday, but this was a much improved performance compared to the meek defeats against Shipdham and Winterton. Winning the toss on a hot afternoon, Phil Soanes had little hesitation in opting to bat first, and his openers Andy Hawes and Philip Wright set about proving his decision correct by compiling their second fifty partnership of the season. Sprowston mixed their bowling about at regular intervals and had plenty of variation, including two left arm seamers, a left arm spinner and an off spinner. Hawes moved through to his first fifty of the season - punishing anything wide severely, whilst Wright looked set to join him when Kaushik Trivedi (brother of the former Drayton all rounder Sudhir) grasped a scorching square cut with the score on 118, with Wright's share 42. Thereafter, Drayton had a disastrous six overs which saw four further wickets fall, including Hawes for 66. With the score at 140-5, Gary Smith and new signing Nigel Armitage set about rebuilding the innings sensibly, with Smith in particular putting the hammer down towards the end of the innings, as the home side ended on 209-5 - Smith finishing unbeaten on 44 and Armitage on 19.

Sprowston quickly lost two wickets to Michael Mario-Ghae generating impressive pace, and generally bowling his best spell of the season. J. Salmon came in and immediately started playing his shots - sometimes taking chances, but generally looking to punish anything remotely stray. Squire was more compact at the other end, but Drayton found a third breakthrough hard to come by. Squire was dismissed by Gary Foreman with the score on exactly 100, whilst Salmon fell ten runs later, for 51, thanks to a diving slip catch by Paul Eggett off Phil Soanes. Ferguson and Graver then compiled a neat partnership of 30, but if Drayton thought they were through the visitors batting when the fifth wicket fell at 140, they were wrong as W. Hampson came in playing some flamboyant attacking shots. Mario-Ghae returned to take two quick wickets to reduce Sprowston to 180-7 - Mario-Ghae finishing with 12-3-32-4, but Hampson and Askham saw Sprowston almost to the finishing line, before Hampson was dimissed with the scores level. A scrambled bye off the first ball of the last over comdemned Drayton to a two wicket defeat, and as a result looking for a win next Saturday at Caister to get their season back on track.