3rds Lose Opening League Match. 1sts Lose Friendly.

The 3rds narrowly failed to defend 137 at Inverleith Park against DT 2nds (Norrie make 49 on debut and also - I hear - being the pick of the bowlers - and fielders!). 65 odd from one of the DT batsman made the difference. No doubt Coastal will fill in the details. Report by DT here; in which the Thirds are described as having several 'tedious slow bowlers'-is this a description of their bowling or their personalities.

At Arbo, the 1sts played out an enjoyable friendly vs Marchmont, Cross making 151 on their 40 overs, with Shannon making a good 50. Batting was difficult early on against some fine bowling from Marchmont's openers but there was some fairly fluent batting in the middle overs before a late collapse. Not a bad score given the soft wicket (it was an end strip) and the long grass in the outfield.

Despite generally tight bowling, a few expensive overs got Marchmont back into it and a flurry of boundaries helped them pass the total with a couple of overs to spare. Marchmont's Kiwi Matt Loeffen impressed with bat and ball (including a hatrick).

Holy Cross: 151 for 8 (40 overs) - S. Bonfield 62, D. Russell 35, C. Ellis 20, K. Fraser 14;
M Loeffen 4-9 (incl. Hattrick)
Marchmont: 152 for 7 (38 overs) - M Loeffen 52, N Chetty 34, N Ghandi 31*
S Bonfield 7-2-14-1
A Graham 4-0-14-0
P Kumar 8-3-19-2
C Ellis 8-2-20-1
A Millington 3-0-21-0
Co Smith 4-0-32-0
D Russell 4-0-26-2
Most importantly, after last week's wash-out, several 1st teamers had some 'middle time' and got through some overs. As could be expected, fielding was rusty....... The 1st XI will hopefully be up to full strength next Saturday when they take on Watsonians 2, at Arbo.Good luck to Marchmont for their 2010 season.