Defeat for Clacks away to Murrayfield

CLACKMANNAN COUNTY travelled to Murrayfield-DAFS in their second league clash of the season.

The weather gad been generous and though it was perfect cricketing weather on Saturday, the result was not so perfect for Clacks.

With last week's win, County were confident and with the edition of overseas player Tanya Kagumba, they probably had the strongest team on the cards.

Newly-appointed skipper Keith Hefer lost the toss and Clacks were put to bat first on a hard, but uneven grass wicket.

With the experience of T Mehboob and Hefer, Clacks bated well on this tricky wicket and built a fighting partnership before Hefer was judged leg before wicket for 18.

The next batsman was G Anderson but before things could have been gotten better for the visitors, they lost another wicket with Mehboob judged LBW for 14.

T Kumba was the next batsman, but went for only scoring two runs before being caught in midwicket.

Clacks were shaken, but not broken, at this point. A Rasul then edged an incoming delivery to the slip area and a thrilling catch was taken by Farooq.

County found themselves in real trouble and needed heroic action from the batsmen and all eyes were on A Alamgir, who saved Clacks' from defeat last week, but unfortunately an ill-judged delivery saw his bails flying the air.

More bad luck came when G Anderson was run out with the next batsmen unable to even score a double figure, apart from D Patel 10 who then edged a short delivery to the wicket keeper.

Final score was 78 in 35.2 overs.

Knowing the low total, Clacks put their best bowling effort with very economical efforts from K Hefer and R Ashraf.

They attacked the wickets but, having a low total on the board, MDAFS batsmen waited and defended the better balls. However, some poor fielding let the bowlers down.

After 12 overs, the run rate was around 2.5 runs and over. The pressure was building on the opposition that saw a suicidal run from their opening batsman and a great effort by A Rasul gave Clacks gave their first wicket.

With the game now going out of their hands, the skipper brought overseas player T Kagumba to the attack, and from the very first ball he impressed with his pace and line length, which sparked a little bit panic in MDAFS camp.

He quickly bowled L Hayes for 38 and send A Dow to the pavilion. A couple of more chances were produced, but poor fielding saw those chances slipped away. In the end, T Kagumba bowled 7-1-21-2.

T Mehboob was only the second bowler from Clacks to take another wicket before Murrayfield chased the target of 78 runs in 21 overs for four wickets.

Clacks will be hoping to return to wining ways in their next game this Saturday against Linlithgow at The Arns.

Meanwhile, the 2nd XI also suffered a heavy defeat in a friendly against Marchment CCC.

Bating first, the opposition scored 257 for six and the County was all out for 120 runs.

The pick of the player from Clacks was young Ali Arshad who bowled and batted well.

However, some good news for Clacks this weekend was that Alloa XI comfortably beat Kinross Cricket Club on Sunday.

Clackmannan CCC would like to thank FES Ltd for the match ball and ground sponsors Total Logistic UK.