Thursday night saw Ivinghoe and Pitstone take on Tring Park in the final league game of the Village T20 competition. This was a game which would decide which team would progress to the knockout rounds in 3rd place with a win for either team securing this position. I&P won the toss and decided to bat first to put a total together for Tring to chase. This was mostly due to the fact that there were a few stragglers to arrive to the game and some last-minute call ups due to confusion about when the game was to be played!

Jonny Badrick and Greg Roach were sent out to get the innings off to a positive start until Jonny chipped one to mid-wicket of the bowling of Camm. Next in was Skipper Adam Culley who characteristically took his sweet time to keep the scoreboard ticking over with singles whilst putting on 50 run partnership with Roach who had brought the biggest broom he could find and continue to play the same sweep shot wherever the ball was bowled! Culley departed for 19 off the skiddy bowling of Pike and Roach reached 34 before being bowled by Curry.

With the score on 64 in the 13th over it brought big hitter Matt Dimbleby to the crease alongside a rejuvenated Alex Groom. With 7 overs remaining these two played positively against some tight bowling from Tring. Another partnership of 52 between these two moved the score to 116 and into the last over before one shot too many from Groom see him stumped and depart for 34 of 27 balls in the final over. Rhys Carrey came to the crease to face the final 4 balls with I&P finishing on 123 for 4 from their 20 overs.

Tring needing to win sent out McCallum and Darraugh to the crease to begin the run chase. Both played sensible cricket shots and soaked a lot of balls up and in the opening overs. I&P bowlers kept tight lines and did not give much away and the game was evenly poised despite the lack of any wickets being taken. The introduction of Ryan Bailey in the 13th over proved to provide the breakthrough as McCallum played the ball onto his wicket for 34 runs. This brought Wale to the crease and with his 2nd and 3rd balls smashed some long hops from Carrey to the boundary for consecutive fours which pushed Tring along closer to their target. However, some excellent tight bowling from Bailey at the other end removed the other opener Darragh who had faced 50 balls for 33 in the 15th over.

With the score on 84 for 2 Tring still looked in good touch to get themselves over the line with wickets in hand still. With the reintroduction of Matt Ferguson immediately proved to be fruitful with the wickets of Wale and Camm in the 18th over. With eighteen runs required off the final 2 overs, the field was spread to prevent any boundaries. Ten runs from Carrey’s final over left Tring with 8 runs required from the final over. The game had come down to the final over with Alex Groom bowling and Tring taking a single and four off the first two balls of the over. Then with only four runs required from four balls Groom took the game out of reach of Tring by taking a remarkable four wickets in four balls!

I&P took the win and end up on level points with Potten End with I&P staying in third due to the worse off net run rate due to the thumping by Aston Clinton the week before. A good win and performance by the team which included excellent tight bowling from all the bowlers, backed up by some tidy fielding from all.