Up at 5.30AM  for those of us in West Devon, leave Plymouth at 6.30AM, nice and quiet on the road. Pick up Dennis and then Adam. All's well until we get to nearly J6 on the M3 then a nasty accident but it doesn't hold us up much. Arrive at Basingstoke & North Hants Sports Club, what a lovely setting a superb pitch. Weather  forecast threatening rain before we start and later..

Warm up, lost the toss and we are put in.  We should have had a leg bye off the first ball and quickly lose Peter Taylor, bowled top of off stump. Samuel Wyatt-Haines, promoted to number 3 joins David Ackford and they put on 44 in very good time, with both players playing some attractive shots and Wyatt-Haines rotating the strike. Ackford then gets a good one that clips the top of off stump having pitched middle. Alistair Chilcott and Wyatt-Haines then put on 73 with Wyatt-Haines playing some marvelous shots and Chilcott supporting, running excellently and playing really well. Chilcott then played at a really wide leggie and plays on, the ball clipping leg stump, can't repeat what I was thinking and Ollie Higgs joins Wyatt-Haines, who has by now passed 50 for the third time in four innings. They put on 44 in no time before Higgs miss times a leg side drive and is caught. Wyatt-Haines in now in the nineties and there is an air of expectation and hope that he will reach his hundred. He certainly deserved it as he was batting far better than his other innings and then he batted well. But it wasn't to be and five runs after Higgs is out Wyatt-Haines goes miss timing  a shot which would have brought up his hundred. It was a great knock, the best of the day and the season that has been seen. You will get there this season, I have no doubt, perhaps even more than once.

With the batting we had 230-250 was still on, we hoped, but wickets fell at regular intervals and only Theo Thomson's 30 not out took Devon to 218-9 off their 45 overs. Below par,  it was felt by 30-40 runs,but don't tell the lads and so it was to prove, or may be not if that man Extras had not featured so heavily again!

Perhaps Mearsy got it wrong but Gillam seemed  to struggled with slope and Ollie Sale too and together with that man Extras Hampshire got off to a good start. In his second over Crouch did have a sharp catch dropped at slip. The introduction of Theo Thomson and Billy Barriball plus excellent fielding, we  won that aspect of the match, did slow things down initially and Barriball's long hop did make the break through but by then Hampshire's openers had taken the score to 72. Jack William's took the second wicket 116-2, and Thomson, reintroduced to take the pace off the ball the third, 179-3, but Hampshire's batsmen knowing what had to be done, under no pressure therefore as the damage had been done, not enough runs scored, kept the score ticking along and knocked the runs off with 5 overs to go.

In truth we weren't as far off as the score suggests. We have made great progress this season but it has not been quiet as quick as would have been hoped. If we had had that little bit of luck, and self belief/confidence has much to do with this and scored another 20-30 runs and not bowled the extras then we could  and should have won, as we could and should have won against Berkshire. It is time for more self belief, more confidence. Someone also needs to stand up and be a hero, make that difference when it's called for. It could be you. Trust in yourself and let it happen. It will happen. You can do it!

15 hours later home, tired and wishing I had not had that BurgerKing!

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