U19T20 2016 Finals Day....
Bank Holiday Monday 1st May saw three teams from around the County come together for the NatWest Under 19 T20 finals day, for 2016. The original finals day was postponed at the end of the 2016 season due to weather, therefore we invited Bishops Stortford, Redbourn, Harpenden and Radlett to the rearranged finals day at Welwyn Garden City CC.
Unfortunately Radlett were unable to raise a side, so that left the three other clubs mentioned above to battle it out for the prize of being the champions of the 2016 competition.
With a round robin format, the first game saw Harpenden bat first taking on Redbourn. After a fast start, Redbourn managed to peg Harpenden back to a score of 167 from their 20 Overs, including A great 50 from Gus Laws Mather. Unfortunately during Redbourns reply the heavens opened and with Redbourn behind the required run rate quite significantly, Harpenden were awarded winners of game 1.
Enter reigning champions Bishops Stortford, who were taking on Redbourn in Game 2. Stortford Sabres batted first and they never really got going, losing regular wickets to a rejuvenated Redbourn bowling attack. Redbourn managed to restrict the Sabres to 104 from their 20 overs.
In their reply, Redbourn were comfortably on their way to the target before again the rain intervened. With Redbourn well infront of the required rate it was agreed that Redbourn be declared winners and we would move on to the final game of the afternoon between Stortford Sabres and Harpenden Heat!
This meant that all three teams were still in the running to be crowned champions, as a win for each of the three teams would mean it would all come down to net run rate.
Harpenden batted first in game 3 and after another good innings from Gus Laws Mather hitting a quick 48, Harpenden got to 119 as a total from 20 overs. This meant that after some quick maths calculations, Bishops Stortford required to reach their target of 120 in 12 overs in order to crown them champions of the competition as winners with the highest run rate.
Stortford began their reply keeping up with the required rate, then it became the Joe Burslem show as he smashed his way to 43 off 24 balls with support from the other end too as Stortford turned on the style and reached their target of 120 in 10.3 overs.
Even the Redbourn players, watching at the side were appreciative of the superb batting display put on by Stortford that meant Redbourn were left as runners up in the competition. Stortford had done it, and the celebrations began! Bishops Stortford, 2016 U19T20 Champions.
A huge congratulations to all three sides taking part in finals day, as well as the other sides that took part in last years group stages of the competition.
Finals day was a huge success, and that is largely due to our fantastic hosts for the day Welwyn Garden City CC who provided food and drink as well as a great pitch to play all three games on.
Finally, a big thank you to the 4th team on the day our Officials, John Sweedy , Jon Holland, and Raj Shah.