All-round Market Rasen First XI earn fine win over Bracebridge Heath

Visiting captain Himesh Silva won the toss and invited Rasen to take the first innings on what turned out to be a very good pitch, prepared by club stalwart Brian Reaney.

Heath unleashed a fiery attack, spearheaded by their professional Silva who attacked the Rasen openers with a very quick burst of seam bowling behind an attacking field.

The Rasen pair of Boryzscuck and Bradford stood up to the pace and took advantage of anything loose to score at a decent rate before Boryzscuck mistimed a pull shot and was caught off a top edge.

Rasen maintained a healthy scoring rate when Paul Martin joined Bradford at the wicket, putting on 77 for the third wicket.

Some tight bowling from Joe Mansford, supported by Stringer, Hardy and Scott wrestled back the momentum, however, as Rasen closed out their innings on 208-8.

In a what looked to be a mirror of the Rasen innings, Bracebridge Heath set about the early bowling, putting on 47 for the first wicket before Boryzscuck made a vital breakthrough.

This brought Steve Scott to the wicket who proved to be a difficult object for Rasen to remove, but great disciplined bowling from Boryzscuck and Penniston reduced the reply to 78-4.

The experienced Scott set purposefully about building what looked to be a match-winning knock and, supported by Peveritt and Mansford, guided the Heath to 165.

But the match turned on an excellent piece of bowling from Charlie Scales who removed Scott for 75 with an excellent caught and bowled.

Rasen seized their hard-earned opportunity as Ivan Nash and Paul Martin set about removing the BBH tail with 10 overs to spare.

Rasen skipper Liam Scales said the credit must be given to the entire team with each player individually contributing.

“This is a side in transition, but I feel that we are learning from each game and working very hard at trying to execute our plans,” he said.

“Today we batted much better as a unit, but in truth I felt we were 30 runs short of where I felt we should have been.

“It made for an entertaining game of cricket, however, and I am confident the side will take a lot of positives from such a well-fought win.”