Frenford 3rd XI Home vs Upminster 3rd XI
45 Over Match
Frenford lost by 5 runs
Upminster 250 - 5 – Daniel Simpson 90 (92) – Ramnick Bhardwaj 2 - 37 (9)
Frenford 245 - All Out (44.4) – Ahmad Hassan 61 (45) – Mark Schofield 5 - 57 (8)

Frenford CC were put to the field by the away team, who sent in their openers, Steve Limn and Daniel Simpson to face the opening bowlers. The weather was clear, sunny and dry, a good batting pitch. Home team opened their bowling with two youngsters, Musa Latif and Zain Akram, the latter of who took the early wicket of Steve Limn to a catch in the slips. The captain of Upminster played a good innings including 11 fours, 2 sixes and 92 balls faced, until his wicket fell to the bowling of Ramnick at the score of 90. The captain left the team at a strong score of 160 -2 with less than half the innings left. The bowlers of Frenford did well to contain the runs with two more wickets for the seamers of Frenford and one more for Ramnick but nearing the end of the innings fielding errors allowed too many runs to slip through allowing for Upminster to accumulate a score of 250 for 5 wickets after 45 overs. Still a manageable total for the Frenford batters.

Frenford needed 251 runs to win in 45 overs with a required run rate of about 5.5
The captain, Aamir Ashraf, opened with Salman Sarfraz and faced the openers of Upminster, Jamie Green and Max Carter-Miller. Under quick pressure by the bowlers of Upminster, Salman was bowled by Max Carter-Miller, allowing Maaz Mehmood to get to the wicket. Maaz held his wicket and played some good strokes until he got to his 59 of 80 balls. but the run rate kept climbing up as a result of good bowling by Upminster bowlers. Then the wicket of Maaz Mehmood fell, putting pressure on the Frenford batters to score quickly in a short number of overs. Ahmad Hassan batted well for his 61 in 45 balls and lower order made some contribution, Frenford got close to the target but before they knew it, they got to the last wicket of Fardeen Mir and Musa Latif. Needing 12 runs in the last six balls, Fardeen hit the first ball for four and then made two more runs. Frenford needed six off four balls. Unfortunately, however, a wild shot to the boundary line became a catch taken by Jamie Green, leaving Frenford, all out, for 245 runs. Upminster won by 5 runs.

Saad Razi