All smiles at Alderley

A quick look at the 'worm' from today's game gives a great visual illustration of an interesting and watchable match at Alderley Edge on Sunday, made all the more so by the beautiful weather and surroundings. Didsbury 3s are the blue line on the worm, and that impressive growth at the early part represents an excellent opening partnership of 125 between the authoritative Michael Taylor and young Basil Sultan, who came straight from his morning match for the U15s, fielded for 45 overs, and then went and batted for almost another 30, showing a very composed head on young shoulders. Michael matched him for intelligent shot selection and was first to his 50, his third in 3 games, before Basil followed with a hook for six, then a cover driven four to bring up his own landmark. All the team applauded loudly and were thrilled to bits for 'the Sultan'.

Little did we suspect that the game was about to take a dramatic twist, as illustrated by those four blue dots clustered together, as nine balls saw four wickets fall with no runs added! Basil called Michael for a single, then stopped, leaving Michael stranded. End of over - Ringo came in and was lbw first ball, the quietness of the appeal took everyone by surprise when it was answered in the affirmative. Five balls later, James top edged an attempted pull, and two balls after that Basil drove straight to cover, departing for 50 off 95 balls. Alderley sensed this was their chance, having created little with the ball and suffering from some distinctly average fielding, both openers dropped and some 30 runs in total being accrued through misfields and half-hearted attempts to stop drives. Added to that 24 extras, and the hosts did themselves no favours.

They couldn't make the pressure of those four wickets count and quickly became quiet again as Jason Jeffery and Chris Elsden calmly restablished control and polished off a very satisfying run chase with 2.4 overs in hand with more excellent shot selection and placement, the worm showing how the game which was suddenly level became firmly Didsbury's again.

Earlier, a bit of a mixed bag in the field had led to the 3s chasing many more than it seemed they were going to. There was little doubt that DB was very unlucky not to have his c&b appeal against captain Harry Elms upheld - Elms, on 19 at the time, made 58 - but the drop of Nathan Pugh when he was 18 (he went on to make 58) was the low point of the day. None of the bowlers bowled badly by any means - indeed, Zain bowled notably well - but on a flat pitch and a hot afternoon, it was very much a batting day, and in some ways Alderley, after the big Pugh-Elms partnership, should have been looking towards 220. The boys worked very hard in the field and kept their concentration very well.

The 20 extras we donated didn't help either - but on the other hand, the over rate was excellent (19 in the second hour), which to be fair, Alderley Edge more than matched, averaging nearly 19 an hour themselves, which helped with the whole spectacle all the more. It was a wonderful afternoon for cricket and good to enjoy a drink afterwards after a hard but rewarding day for everybody.

Next week the 3s entertain Hyde at home, looking to keep up a strong start. 2.00pm start at Didsbury, all very welcome.