Alcester & Ragley 1st 159 all out lost to Catherine be Barnes 188-9 by 29 runs D

Ragley commenced their league campaign with a disappointing loss away at Catherine de Barnes on Saturday. Ragley won the toss and elected to field and some tight bowling by all the first 4 bowlers restricted Catney to 97-4 from the first 32 overs. The pick of the bowlers were the Readers brothers, Geoff and Julian, who finished with figures of 2-30 and 2-32 rescpectively. They were backed up in the field by some excellent catching and ground fielding. In the final 13 overs however Catney more than doubled their score, helped in the main by a major disaster in the Ragley fielding as 9 catches went down in this time, and this proved to be the reason for the final outcome in the match. Young Sam Westwood bowled well on his debut for the 1st XI, as he returned figures of 1-18 from 6 overs. Bennett top scored for Catherine de Barnes with 73.

Ragley got off to an electric start in reply as another debutant, Australian Colin Devincentiis raced to 19 in 3 overs before a smart piece of stumping saw him on his way. Adam Peachey came in and kept Ragley up with the scoring rate before 3 quick wickets fell upon his demise to leave Ragley at 76-4, Peachey had amassed 40 of these. Matt Greenway(19) and Ben Lee (18)  recovered the score to lift them to 126-4, but once these 2 were out the runs required were beyond the lower order batsmen, although some sensible late batting from Tom Morris (18) and J Reader ensured Ragley picked up extra points from a very disappointing game, in which they dominated for the 1st third. Ragley entertain Bidford on Saturday at Ragley Hall, 2pm start, game to be sponsored by Autolamps of Alcester.