The Third XI made it a hat-trick of wins for the first time. Ashley Cocking (35) and Will Robbins (28 not out) led the way to 149-9 (D Frostick 3-26, A Wellen 2-28). Bedhampton were restricted to 130-7 (L Keeping 29, Robbie Cocking 2-9).
Ryde arrived with Tommy Barton in their side, who two weeks ago smashed 34 sixes in his 331 not out, as they scored 518-2. Andy won the toss, and wisely chose to bat! After 3 overs, with score on 8-1, it rained, and Ryde got an early ferry home.
IBM won the toss, and with rain in the air and a grassy pitch, asked Sarisbury to bat first. The opening bowling pair of Ashley Cocking (9-0-30-1) and Kaush Kundu (9-4-29-1) bowled tightly, restricting the hosts to only 19 off the first 10 overs. The bowling continued to be tight with Jeff Yarney at one end (8-2-22-0) and Robbie Cocking at the other (5-1-16-0), and at drinks Sarisbury had limped along to 54 without loss. The first wicket was taken by William Robbins (5-0-18-1), clean bowling the opener, with the score on 78 in the 26th.
The Third XI faced Sarisbury VI on Saturday at Wide Lane. Both teams fielded what appeared to be roughly equal teams in terms of adults and colts and it looked like we were in for a good game of cricket. What followed proved exactly that....
Nick Wood led the Thirds as the family Robbins assembled at Farlington on the occasion of Shirley's half-century of years, but the losing sequence continued. Prasad Panicker (49) top-scored as Kerala closed on 173-9 (Tom Stevens 2-19). IBM 95-9 (Mahadevan Ramanan 24, Joly Varghees 2-11).
After a frantic change of location we ended up playing Rowner II's in Stubbington. Skip lost the toss and was asked to bowl on a very green wicket. Our opening pair of Ashley Cocking (10-2-27-0) and William Robbins (10-0-42-0) bowled tightly restricting Rowner to only 29 off the opening 11 overs, however we couldn't break the opening partnership until the 19th over, with the score 70, when we took out both openers with 2 fantastic catches at point by Robbie Cocking (one of them airborne that Jonty Rhodes would have been proud of!).
Locks Heath won the toss and put IBM into bat first. We were off to a shaky start after the loss of our two opening batsmen for only 3 runs. Rob Lamprey (21) came to the crease with Robbie Cocking (15) to ease the IBM nerves. Ashley Cocking put on 26 runs and Ram with 29 runs further steadied the IBM batting nerves.