Kent Under 15 girls’ first away match to be played was at The Hub in Regent’s Park v Middlesex, on Saturday 19th June 2010. The weather forecast was mixed and though it was very windy at the Hub itself, the travelling supporters tucked themselves behind the trees, well out of the wind. It turned out to be a day of sunshine and light showers, but despite this there were thankfully no rain interruptions.

With Kent missing 2 senior players due to injury and several girls playing with niggling injuries, they hoped to finish the game quickly. Having come close to Kent in the first match (batting first) and with Kent Captain Grace Gibbs winning the toss for Kent and choosing to put Middlesex in to bat first again, Middlesex probably thought they had a good chance.
 
This thought was to be short lived when opening bowler Charlotte Pape struck in the 2nd over, 4th over and then 3 times for a hat-trick in the 8th over. The accuracy and pace of Pape’s bowling proved too much for the Middlesex top order, with 4 wickets bowled and one LBW in her 5 for 5 off 6 overs.

Only the Middlesex Captain, Rebecca Mannick (40) stood fast and helped put on partnerships of 29 for each of the 6th and 7th wickets before she herself was comprehensively bowled by young Lottie Bryan. With wickets for Tash Farrant, a painful caught and bowled by Emma Waters to take Groves (the only other Middlesex player to get into double figures) and a second for Bryan, it was Pape who was left to calmly run out the last Middlesex batter.

Middlesex finished on 84 all out in 25.4 overs, an improvement for Kent on the first fixture when they only took 7 Middlesex wickets.

Although the target was not huge, the events from the first fixture where the Kent top order crumbled showed that this was by no means a forgone conclusion.   When Daisy Moore struck with the first ball of the innings, Kent needed to rally quickly to prevent this happening again.

Emma Marsh and Charlotte Pape, took their time made the most of the chances for running the extras and made some fine shots to put on 71 for the second wicket. When Pape was given out LBW by Taylor for 25, Kent were only 14 runs from victory and with Farrant joining Marsh (29 not out) at the crease it took less than 2 overs for them to finish the job. Extras top scored with 31 but many of these were due to superb running between Marsh and Pape.

Even the early evening London traffic on the way home couldn’t dampen Kent’s spirits and having now played 5 and won 5, they have a short break before their next match v Sussex away on 10th July.

A scorecard is available for download.