Braintree cc’s 2nd XI suffered a chastening defeat at the hands of Sudbourne hall, a 156 run defeat in the end.

Sudbourne hall made a slow start to their innings and lost two early wickets as Theo Sherry and Callum Lazarus picked up one apiece, each bowler disturbing the timber of their respective batsman. The score was slowly ticked past 50 before Ritchie was caught by Lazarus off the bowling of Joe Osborne. He picked up another as he cleaned up Stowe. Opener Nisbet reached his 50 and took the score past 150 before young bowler Charlie Moore picked up his maiden league wicket. He picked up another via a great stumping from keeper Jeremy Hollingsworth and Sherry also got his second. The home side finished on 206-7 from their 45 overs.

Hollingsworth and Nick Lockhart were opening for the dolphins and neither lasted long, both having their stumps castled. The fall of wickets continued as skipper Andrew Gowers was also bowled. Joe Osborne didn’t last much longer. At this stage, the score was 27-4 and from then on it was a procession as no batters could get the ball away. Both Charlie Garner and Theo Sherry faced a considerable amount of balls but scoring was difficult, mainly due to some accurate bowling from the home side. Braintree ended up on only 50, a tough day for the dolphins but one to move on from quickly as they face Copford at home this Saturday.