TOMMY: A hot afternoon beneath the Castle was even more enriched by a run feast on the flattest wicket I have ever seen at Parkside Road.

St Anne's Jimmy Adams made his second century in Kendal this summer, but it was not enough, as we reached their target of 259 in 51 overs, leaving us enough balls to have made a few more, which thankfully were not needed.

Craig Walmsley was magnificent, setting the tone to our run chase with skill and fine shot selection, his ability to strike a cricket ball is a marvellous talent, and with his fine running between the wickets and natural speed he has become, and will be, a thorn in many opponent's side. All the other top five batsmen produced very good controlled innings, so we took a much-needed 12e points and a much happier captain was I.

It was nice to see after the game that Keith Fawcett can still find something to moan about, if this didn't happen, I think I would wonder what was going on. The dressing room has been a bit quieter since Keith's retirement last year, although there is continued joviality from various corners of the room. It's funny how people have to sit in the same place in the dressing room and our supporters do this as well around the ground .

Graham Clarke, for instance, has sat in his corner of the dressing room for 21 years and on his arrival at the ground he places his clothes on the second peg from the window and his helmet on the first, this must be quite a comfort for him, but the seat is starting to moan just as much as Keith - only a joke you two - I do realise you are the stalwarts of the club.

Leyland Daf away on Saturday is a tricky little fixture and a game that will need our full concentration, good fielding and prolonged spells of good aggressive bowling to create wicket-taking opportunities.

DAVE: A day out at Blackpool, toss won and maximum 15 points in the bag; what a great effort!

A very good batting display with Kev Howarth taking the honours and seeing the side through to a defendable total. As the scorecard shows the innings was a bit stop start and we were not quite sitting easy when Dan George walked to the crease with seven wickets down, but the next partnership proved to be a match-winning one as the two of them batted well together with Dan defiant against all the Blackpool attack.

We then possibly bowled the best we have done this season, with Jammi being the unlucky one having a couple of dropped catches off him, but still bowling well.

Kabir and Kev then went to work on the Blackpool batting line up taking wickets at regular intervals, with Kabir picking up all their main batters at the right time, both finishing with five wickets a piece.

Sunday we lost in a tied game to Fleetwood away having lost one more wicket than they did, a cruel way to loose but a great game of cricket in the coloured kit.

For us it was again the Kabir and Kev show with them both making sure we posted a decent total, but we then could just not manage to defend it, with Chris Miller being the pick of our bowlers.

The highlight of the weekend must go to our second team who won two games out of two, which hasn't happened for a while!

Well done guys and here's hoping it will continue.

Both wins were down to a great all-round team effort with everyone contributing. Individual performances of note were Paul Dowker continuing to score good runs and aiming to overhaul the clubs second team batting record; Phil Ellwood who posted two good scores and hopefully will continue to develop and become a future first team opening batter; skipper Andy Dugdale who contributed with both bat and ball; and Gary Baker who continues to improve as a keeper. Possibly the biggest achievement was by Aidan Caswell a 16-year-old up and coming swing bowler who took a hat-trick against Fleetwood on Sunday to finish off their innings with all three being cleaned bowled, well done Aidan!

Home to Darwen this Saturday, hopefully the rain and thunder has now cleared and we will get the opportunity to take points off a strong Darwen side who in my mind are still title contenders. It is also ladies day at Shap Road so there will be 60 drunken ladies cheering us on, Happy days!