Bedford Sunday leapfrog to the top after win against leaders New Bradwell

Despite missing a lot of regular first team players, Bedford played the perfect game and sit at the summit of Bedfordshire County Cricket League Division One, ahead of Biddenham on nett run rate.

Batting first, half centuries from Rohit Mehmi and Maninder Singh set the innings up perfectly with Bedford reaching 224-8 from their 40 overs with Rhys Nicholas (3-35) the stand out bowler for New Bradwell.

With the game poised at the halfway stage, New Bradwell collapsed to 61-5 and could not recover, eventually bustled out for just 95 with Jonny Dove (4-35) picking up wickets at regular intervals.

Biddenham’s impressive run chase against Queens Park Westfield sees them level on points with Bedford after Sam Byrne’s 109 from 91 balls saw them past Queens Park’s score of 235-5 on a good batting track at Biddenham.

Earlier, Mahmood Khan (54) and Mustafa Mughal (50) had set Queens Park up nicely, but a partnership of 182 between Byrne and Abhilash Pandey (77) helped Biddenham home with 37 balls to spare.

In Division Five, Bedford’s second XI suffered due to squad shortages and eventually lost by 11 runs to Godmanchester Town.

Three wickets apiece for Umar Mughal (3-41) and Khaneal Statham (3-55) did most of the damage as Godmanchester reached 206-9 and, despite Jivesh Ghandi’s unbeaten 54, Bedford could only reach 195 in response.

Bedford’s Saturday XI’s struggles continued as they fell to another heavy loss at Wellingborough Indians.

A 71 for Hari Patel helped Wellingborough to 225 and, despite a swift 33 from Statham, Bedford fell to 119 but still sit outside the relegation places ahead of this weekend’s fixture against mid-table, S&L Corby.

There were also fixtures for both U15 Girls and Boys sides, with the U15 male side beating Blunham in the cup, before the Girls fell narrowly to Ickwell.

Avaani Katechia top-scored for Bedford with 26 as the home side reached a nett score of 195 with Amelia Friedenthal taking two wickets in a losing cause that saw Ickwell win by just seven runs.

But to see both sides field two full teams with buckets of potential is a big positive for Girls’ cricket in the county.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​