Hayden and Hunty come to the rescue to secure win

Bitteswell were the visitors to Bassett Avenue for week 6's fixture in what is always a tricky fixture for Niffy 2's. The visiting skip lost the toss which made it 4 out of 4 tosses falling in Smig's favour this season and he asked Bitteswell to bat 1st. Matt Sharpe and Hayden took the new ball and Matt was unlucky to have Bateman dropped early on by the specialist gully Joey Hawker. Fortunately for Niffy this didn't cost much as Hayden got one to rise steeply in the next over and Bateman could only get a nick to Garry at 1st slip who duly controlled the ball on his chest and caught the rebound. Hussain was timing the ball well at the other end and was joined by Charlton as they put on 62 before Joey Hawker came on to replace Hayden and enticed Hussain to pop one up to Matt McDonald at cover. Charlton was batting well at the other end and was lucky to survive as the specialist gully dropped another off Matt Sharpe. Hunty eventually took over at the cow field end and turned the game in Niffy's favour as he bowled another excellent spell for Niffy 2's. Runs were hard to come by for Bitteswell's batsmen and wickets fell steadily, with James eventually getting through his 11 overs, 6 maidens, 4 wickets for just 20 runs.

Joey Hawker returned at the Bassett end and took another 3 wickets, one of which was a result of a catch of the season contender from Matt McDonald as he pulled off a dive that Victor Moses could only dream of on the cow corner boundary to dismiss the dangerous Dexter for 23. Quite superb. Joey finished with figures of 11-1-42-4 as Bitteswell finished their innings on 160-9 from their 45 overs.

Niffy's turn with the bat couldn't of started much better as Garry pulled the first 2 balls of the innings through the leg side for 4. However the early promise didn't last as he was 1st to depart in the 3rd over, looking to repeat the same pull shot to one that wasn't quite short enough and he was bowled by Dexter for 12. Smig joined Badger at the crease and he didn't bother to hang around as he missed a straight one by about 6 inches, continuing his delightful form in the process and departing for a 2nd ball duck. Macca joined Badger at the crease with instructions not to follow in the skips footsteps and he hung around until Badger chopped on for 11, which left Niffy in an all too familiar position this season at 30-3. Ed Naylor was in at 5 and slowly started to rebuild with Matt until Macca was bowled, again off the inside edge. 45-4 now meant we were in considerable trouble but the skip was confident that if a partnership could be built they still had a decent chance. Jacko was in at 6 and after somehow surviving the easiest slip catch you will ever see, defended well and looked to score when he could. Ed was next man out to make it 59-5 and Jacko went shortly after, another man bowled off the inside edge which reduced Niffy to 61-6 and the win looked increasingly unlikely.

However Hayden Willan and James Hunt then decided to show the top order how to bat and combined beautifully to bring Niffy back into the contest. Hayden played sensibly and brought out the big shots where necessary whereas Hunty rotated the strike and punished anything over pitched through the covers. Both of them were now well set and proceeded to make batting look simple with neither offering a chance as they knocked off the remaining runs for the win. Hayden finished on 59* and James 36*in a partnership of exactly 100 in 15 overs in what was a great effort from both to secure the 25 points. Food for thought for the top order though and lessons need to be learnt as we can't keep putting ourselves under pressure and changes will have to be made as we move onto Medbourne next week.