It was a double header week with the 1s facing Oakley at home and the 2s facing Oakley away. Always funny when that happens in the schedule. 

On a scorching hot day, whoever won the toss was likely to bat first, and that is exactly what happened with Herriard winning the toss. Opening paid Andrew Butler and Shashank Agrawal started slow but steady, using up lots of good deliveries from the opening bowlers. They didn't wait around once the bad balls came though and started punching through the Oakley ring. The score steadily rose to 100-0, the kind of partnership that they will be hoping to replicate throughout the season. Shortly after this though the partnership fell with Andrew making 54 and Shashank 52. After the fantastic start, the middle order came in and continued the work, working tirelessly to make sure that we'd have batting to come later on, enabling us to throw in some more risky shots in search of late runs. James Down and Nishin Haris were excellent and towards the end started taking it to the Oakley bowlers who were tiring. James even hit his first league six after playing for the last 14 years! Herriard reached 242-4 from their 40 overs, a very good score. 

Even with a good score on the pitch, the bowlers and fielders needed to be on it from ball one as we know there are a lot of runs to be had in the Herriard pitch. It was a quick start from Oakley so seemed to race past 50 and towards 100. However, this high run rate came at the cost of wickets, with Oakley 93-5 at one point. There was then a dangerous partnershipstarting to build as the bowlers kept working away. Heads didn't drop though and eventually Herriard bowled Oakley out for 164, achieving max points along the way. Pavan Maddula with 3-44, Roy Down with 3-25 and Shashank Agrawal with 2-18 being the pick of the bowlers.

The 2s also won the toss and decided to bat on the hot afternoon in the sun. Oakley, like Herriard, offers little protection from the sun in the open field. At Oakley you have the beauty of being able to watch back your dismisals (and highlights) through their recording of the fixture. Some of our batsmen won't want to watch theirs back though with three falling to run outs. To be fair it was the perfect day for a barbecue. 

Herriard were steady with runs, but 73-5 left them with work to do. A 61 run partnership between Scott Weston and Jagadeesan Marappan brought the score back on track before Scott fell at 134-6. However Jagadeesan went on and top scored with 59 to help the side reach 199-9, one run short of full batting points. 

At 105-3 and a large partnership forming, Oakley must have been confident of bringing it home, but four wickets for seven runs put them in a world of trouble, that eventually saw them bowled out for 155. Izzy Apperley with 3-30, Jagadeesan Marappan with 3-33 and Mani Singh with 2-24 were the pick of the bowlers. 23 points for the 2s who remain unbeaten, with three wins in four.