17th May - 3rd XI V Orpington

The 3s travelled a short distance to Raleys ground at the Rugby Club in Sevenoaks.

Never a great wicket Orpington Ocelots were asked to bat first and when Josh Rogers hit the opener on the helmet first ball with one that jumped off a length we feared the worst. Whilst the wicket remained tricky with very variable bounce the first ball was the worst misbehaver of the day. Josh Rogers and Seb Read opened the bowling and enjoyed no luck beating the batsmen regularly. Harry Robinson bowled a tidy spell but the breakthrough eventually came as Alfie Pearson picked up the opener but with the score at 91 the Vine were in trouble. With the exception of Robinson all the bowlers went for around 5 an over. Wickets were shared around by Read (2) A Pearson (3) H Tudor (2) and M Poole (1) but Orpington reached 210-8.

The chase got off to a steady start but just as Richard Wood and Josh Rogers were accelerating Wood fell for 31 followed shortly after by Rogers for 26 and Robinson for an unlucky duck leaving us at 66-3 after 19 overs. The innings never really picked up from there and a fine spell of 5-16 off 8 overs from one of their seamers extinguished any hope as the Vine limped to 136-9 at the close.

A disappointing defeat but ultimately we were chasing too many runs on a very difficult batting surface.