The Atkins' diet

Goresbrook's U11's gave another good team performance in Sundays Hayden Davies Cup Tie at the May and Baker ground but were ultimately to end up as the losing side against the strong bowling attack of the visitors. All the bowlers have shown great improvement in their accuracy in recent weeks and gave away significantly fewer wides than in previous games. Stanley Sleight continued his fine form with the ball coming on first change and bowling the well settled opener for 5.Only Hornchurch's no3 C Brooks, who retired on 26*, really got in against some good bowling and 9 year old Kenny Huynh, following stand out spells for the U'9s got a wicket on his U11 debut. The pick of the bowlers was George Sleight who grabbed 2-5 but it must be said that all the boys bowled and fielded well, nabbing 4 wickets to run outs, one to a direct lob from Matthew Elsom.
Church's 96 looked to be in reach when Krishan Kumar dispatched the first ball of the innings for a four through long off but he was bowled attempted to repeat the feat. Alfie Atkins batted sensibly building a 45 run partnership with Nathan Dowridge before the latter was run out for a fine 10. The low bounce made keeping troublesome and Atkins ensured that byes kept the score ticking along. However after Atkins retired with 25* (including 3 boundaries) in the 13th over the runs dried up against an extremely accurate Hornchurch attack. Just 5 runs were scored in the last seven overs but credit must be given that just 6 wickets were lost in pursuit of this lofty target.
With more games to come in the next few weeks continued improvements can justifiably be anticipated.