With the sun shining, the 1s arrived at Beaconsfield Road and were greeted with the same pitch the 2s had played on the previous week. Widnes typically has absolute roads, but this one was rather used and so promised to take some spin. That's the understatement of the year. Nick again won the toss, and we were batting first.

It was a story of starts with kicking on, all of the Dids top 9 reaching double figures, but only 1 score higher than 30. Widnes' Irish paceman Trent McKeegan bowled a lovely spell, going for 17 overs straight and nicking off both Haf and Rob in his 2-56. Scoring wasn't easy as the pitch was quite two paced and slow, with McKeegan lifting it off a length every so often from his end. Tim kept the scoring rate high in the first 10, hitting 6 boundaries in his 30 before carving Aaron Soni to Luke McCoy on the deep cover boundary. Rob carried on where Tim left off, and was looking great for his 23, but perhaps a few potential barbecues unsettled him, and we were 95-3 off 22. Despite these breakthroughs for Widnes, Dids kept the scoreboard ticking throughout the innings, Abhay anchoring amongst the dismissals of Tim and Rob with a patient 30 off 69.

Nick came in when Rob fell, and combined with Abhay, Steve, and Charlie saw us through to the 37th over, with 134-5 on the board. He then started to accelerate, hitting McCoy for two big bombs. Charlie hit a delightful straight six, followed by a reverse sweep for 4, but Widnes kept taking wickets at the perfect times, Aaqib Uppal bowling him behind his legs, 186-6. Nick kept picking off boundaries, but after missing a few attempted slog sweeps he was bowled by Uppal, spinning one back onto off stump, having provided a fantastic 62 off 80.

Dids continued to press on with their scoring, but also continued to lose regular wickets, and after a quickfire 24 from Alex, they were bowled out for 243 in the last over. With the ball really starting to turn and the pitch being low and slow, Nick was quite happy with the score.

In all honesty, Widnes never really looked like wanting to get them. After a few early boundaries, Liam bounced out Rohan Luthra, caught really well by Rob, sprinting around from first slip to short fine leg. This brought the two Burns brothers together. Over the next 24 overs they nudged and nurdled the ball around, and with the help of a few boundaries scored 80 in the process. But it just felt like the game was drifting, Dids were bowling really well with no reward, and the rate was starting to climb more and more. After batting 79 balls for 24 with just the one boundary, Matt Burns suddenly decided to jump out of his bunker and clout one for six. This rush of excitement must have been enough for him, because he didn’t hit another boundary for the rest of his innings. However, Abhay got the breakthrough, getting Louis Burns to feather through to Charlie for a well-made 52. Two more wickets, Uppal for 8, and M. Burns for a sedate 35 off 103 (some exhilarating innings I’ve watched the last few weeks), and Dids had an opening, 6 wickets required, but with only 111 runs and 14 overs left. Skipper Alex Hewitt came out and tried to play some shots to keep up with the rate, but it was a tough ask. His dismissal in the 46th over, slicing it to Rob at backward point off Abhay, set off a run of 5 wickets in 16 balls (including a first short leg grab for the Crab in 2 seasons), and suddenly Dids were staring at an unlikely win, having 6.3 overs to bowl at the last pair.

Steve, Abhay and Will had been bowling really well all innings with almost no reward, but the pitch was now really starting to rag, and luck just wasn't quite on our side. A few chances popped up but to places where fielders weren't, and their number 10 Palitha Kumara looked like he'd given it away by charging at Abhay, but only just got back in time before Charlie took the bails off. However, the most gut-wrenching was yet to come. With the last ball of the 52nd over, Abhay looked like he'd bowled Kumara sweeping round his legs, the ball rolled into the stumps and nestled against them without knocking the bails off. The only remaining chance was when McKeegan seemed to leave one alone right in front of middle, but the appeal was probably rightly turned down after an unfortunate bit of extra bounce. As it was, the batsman safely negotiated the final overs and earned a draw. The result meant that Hyde overtook us by just one point for the first time this season, after their win against Bowdon.

It's been a pretty frustrating few weeks for the 1s. They haven't really done much wrong, and mixed with not just a pinch of misfortune have come away with only 1 win in their last 5 league games, including three matches with opponents stitching for a draw at home. It's a shame that we've lost the ground we gained by playing so well in the win-lose phase at the start of the season, but the luck and form is sure to turn around as we move into the second half of the league season, and just 5 games left until the return of win-lose and the pink ball.