The 1st XI had high hopes of securing a much-needed first league victory away at Meigle this week but had those hopes dashed by the first man on the field, Meigle batter Harjeet Brar, who anchored Meigle’s innings with 128 off 138 balls, batting for 48 overs. Gareth bowled economically and took late consolation wickets, finishing with figures of 10-1-34-4, and Chris Bowness was similarly miserly, conceding 30 runs off his 10 overs and taking one wicket. Nevertheless, Meigle put on 266/9 in their 50 over innings. Watsonian’s batting scorecard was somewhat more encouraging, with both openers getting starts and Bruce Weatherhead (43) and Kenneth Rae (45) putting on a useful 78 run partnership for the fourth wicket. Our scoring rate wasn’t high enough to make the chase likely, confirmed by DLS when the rain set in after 36 overs of our innings. We finished on 144/5, roughly 35 runs behind the required total.

The 2nd XI hosted Musselburgh at Myreside. Having ceded our captain to the 1st XI, Will Ellison took his place and opted to bowl first having won the toss. As for the 1s, the opposition opener made things difficult for us. Vignesh Devaraj played a muscular innings of 91, taking his team to 158 for 4 when he fell, unhappily, to a run out in the 32nd over. Kevin Singh took an excellent catch off former Musselburgh man Evan Howe’s bowling. Vikash had the best figures of 2/27 off his 8 overs in a match rather bizarrely shortened to 40 overs each before the start of play, despite there being only the barest hint of rain and that for a minute or two at the open. Musselburgh finished on 185/8. Pleasingly, there were lots of contributions to our highest successful chase of the season so far, notably Rob Loomes’ 42 off 35 and Xander chipping in a couple of very entertaining 6s to up the pace of scoring, one clearing his teammates en route to the Murray Pavilion. We won by 3 wickets with two overs to spare after a very measured innings that kept the spectators engaged without ever causing too much anxiety.

The 3rd XI hosted Stewart’s Melville’s corresponding team at Craiglockhart. We lost the toss and were put in to bat. The sunshine contended with cloud and residual moisture on the ground to start making conditions tricky. Chris Cox batted well from the get-go, lasting 24 overs and making 36, anchoring our innings. His highest partnership was 38 with Jaideep. Jaideep’s wicket catalysed a mini collapse, taking us from 94/4 to 107/7 but John Dew and Magic Maclean (32) steadied the ship, adding 40 for the 8th wicket, our highest partnership, seeing us finish on 151/8 after 40 overs. During tea, all the clouds cleared, and we had beautiful sunshine. John Dew was very miserly opening the bowling, ably partnered by Aryaman, and Finlay bowled a lovely five-over first change spell from the top end, taking two crucial top-order wickets. Louis was very effective on a pitch offering variable bounce, taking 1 for 8 off his five overs. When Magic was thrown the ball, SM were on 58/3 after 21 overs, with the rate climbing. He and captain Jonny Potton took 7 wickets between them (4 and 3 respectively), cleaning up the SM tail to win by 54 runs with nearly five overs remaining. Another great team performance with some good fielding and catching on display. The 3s march on!

The 4th XI played their RHC peers at Gyle Park, opting to bat first. Ewan Robertson played a captain’s innings, making 25 runs to top-score. Sadly, extras were his only competitor (23) in the scoring stakes with wickets falling at regular intervals, including three on a score of 69. Our total of 91 all out was less than forbidding. They do say you mustn’t judge a pitch until both sides have batted, and this was never truer than at Gyle Park. Wickets tumbled in the RHC innings courtesy of our youngsters Lewis Scott (taking 3 wickets for 11 runs on senior debut, age 13) and Ethan Haire (2 for 25 off 7 overs), leaving them adrift at 48/7. Our hopes were raised, only to be dashed by a robust knock from Najeeb Shaik who made 38 off 26, including three 6s and two 4s, to help RHC surpass our total, still seven wickets down, in the 26th over.