Bamford Fieldhouse Cricket Under 13s through to Cup semi-final

Date published: 21 June 2009

Bamford Fieldhouse 104-87 - Royton 74-9 (Home)
In the Saddleworth & District U13s Cup, Bamford had a convincing victory over a tenacious Royton side that sets up a semi-final tie against Heyside.

A new opening pair of Joe Smith-Butler and Abbu Alam got Bamford off to a flying start before Smith Butler was run out for 12 off 13 balls and Alam retired on 30 off only 16. Bamford then suffered their regular middle order collapse with three of the next four batsmen managing only 10 between them. Ben Durrant and Alex Willis then steadied the ship, both reaching double figures before the tail chipped in with a few runs in the last couple of overs. The pick of the Royton bowlers were Jack Hurst with 2 for 5 and William Sandiford-Mitchell with 1 for 4.

Bamford then set off well in the field and after 10 overs had Royton 20 for 6. Accurate bowling saw Smith-Butler getting one wicket from 2 overs for no runs and Callum Belfield picking up 1 for 3. The fielding was also excellent with 3 of the vistors run out and very few runs given away. Then Bamford took their foot off the gas with bowling and fielding becoming a little slipshod and this, alongside some very disciplined batting from Sandiford-Mitchell (32 N.O.) well supported by Hurst, lead to Royton seeing out all of their 20 overs.

With the semi-final on the 12 July at Bamford, the team have three matches, including one against Heyside, to fine-tune their skills and if they all play to the best of their abilities, there is no reason why they cannot progress to the final.

The other semi-final sees Moorside entertain league leaders Saddleworth 'A'.