Red ball returns to Spicers
The Rams gear up for the first red ball home game of the season, and could be about to face their most difficult task in keeping their impressive run of wins going.
They face Bury St Edmunds who have emerged as one of the front runners and currently sit fourth with three wins and a draw from the first six games. Bury dominated their game against Great Witchingham last week but were unable to fully force home their advantage. Having already beaten one of the title favourites Mildenhall and suffering the narrowest of defeats to Copdock they are clearly a dangerous opponent. Their depth of batting suggests that even if they were to struggle in the match it would still be a challenge to bowl them out. They have three batters in the leagues’ top six, Ben Seabrook, Josh Cantrell and Jacob Miltz, and Rufus Easdale among the bowling honours.
The Sawston and Babraham skipper, Dan Heath, is delighted to have almost a full squad to choose from, and had some difficult decisions to take. He has Noah Thain and George Darlow back but Nathan Buck is again absent. Our Cambs boys return from Tring having narrowly failed to lift the Minor Counties T20 title and will be looking to put one over their Cambs colleague Seabrook.
On Sunday the Rams face another stern test when they face Brentwood in the National Club Championship. The Essex side are likely to feature several players on the fringes of the county set up at Essex, and a side that has much more experience of this competition and format. There is likely to be some great competitive cricket on show, and it will be well worth a watch.
The Rams 2nd string travel North, to Peterborough and beyond, Sean Ward don’t forget your passport!, as they face Ufford Park. They will be looking to get their season back on track when they face this highly experienced Whitings’ side. The hosts sit one point and two places higher than the Rams with both sides looking for the win that will propel them towards the top four. Traditionally, Ufford Park are a stronger team with the bat, and so the Rams will need to up their own performance as a batting unit. After the trials and tribulations in trying to get a side together last week skipper Nick Griggs has an all too different headache this week. He has Sean Ward, Matthew Day and Alex Stafford all back from first team duty. To that he can add the returning Sean Jenkins, Marc Pearson and Bill Wailey.
All this availability adds up to almost an embarrassment of riches for Rams 3rd team skipper, Jake Ellis, as he has Oliver Borley, Ian Smith and Sanish Gopalan joining the squad from the seconds. He also welcomes back Liam Flynn, Scott Barker, Torin Phelps and Jon Windsor for the visit, to Babraham, of Madingley II’s. The Rams will be looking to move up the table against a side sitting below them in the table with one win from four matches. With no fourth team game unfortunately a few miss out but there will be a few of the veterans glad of the rest after a difficult time last weekend.