Humphries and Rothwell star as 1st XI win at HMV

On Saturday the 1st XI travelled to Stockport to play Heaton Mersey Village hoping to keep up their Division 2 promotion chase. In a low-scoring game, they won by four wickets.

Skipper Chris Shenton lost the toss and was pleasantly surprised when HMV's skipper elected to bat first. Stuart Elkes struck twice early on to remove both openers before the home team had double figures on the board. However a rally by Ajit Phadke and Chris Barlow rescued HMV's poor start, taking the score past 50 before Barlow became the first of Neil Humphries' victims.

Humphries then tore through the rest of HMV's batting as they finally succumbed with just 98 runs on the board. Humphries finished with 6 for 12 and Elkes 3 for 23. In addition, man-of-the-match Humphries also ran out HMV's skipper, David Bailey. Phadke was the mainstay of the innings, scoring 46.

Audlem's reply started well as Andy Capper and Kemal Toraman put on 29 for the first wicket, when Toraman was out for 19. Oliver Burney joined Capper and they added 17 before Phadke firstly removed Burney and, one run later Capper, both batsmen having scored 9.

Tom Measures and Andy Rothwell then shared a match-winning partnership that took the score to 96 when Measures was out for 14. Requiring just three runs to win Audlem lost two more wickets one run later as both Shenton and Jon Broome registered ducks. Almost inevitably, Humphries joined Rothwell and, with each man scoring a single, took the score to 99 for 6. Rothwell finished with an excellent 34 not out.

Audlem gained 25 points and HMV 5. The win moves the 1st XI into second place, just one point behind leaders Glazebury and two points ahead of third-placed Ellesmere Port in what appears to be a three-horse race for the two promotion places.

On Saturday the 1st XI welcome Holmes Chapel to the Gorse Croft. Play starts at 2.00 pm.

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