Second tie of the season for Warwickshire Women
Warwickshire Women experienced their second tie of the season when they restricted Nottingham from reaching a target of 161 in their away fixture of the Royal London County One-Day Championships.
Captain Marie Kelly won the toss at Lady Bay Ground and elected to bat first, with openers Amy Jones and Gwenan Davies starting well with a 58-run partnership. Jones smashed six boundaries off her 27 deliveries, for a total of 34 runs.
Davies was the first to be dismissed as Nottingham’s Kirstie Gordon broke the visitors’ partnership.
Just as Jones was hoping to stabilise the attack with Thea Brookes, who had joined in, she was caught by Megan Burton off Gordon for 20.
Gordon went on to record a five-fer by claiming the subsequent wickets of Laura Crofts (11) and Georgia Davis (0).
The Bears were 106 for five when captain Marie Kelly was caught by Georgie Boyce off Lucy Higham for 20 runs. That is when Joanne Gardner was then joined by debutant Amelia Kite and the two managed to push the score up to 137.
Gardner was run out by Sonia Odedra but left the crease with a second highest score of 22 after Jones’ 34.
In reply, Nottinghamshire were given a tough time with the bat and were lucky to walk away with a tie.
Despite not getting a desirable early wicket, the Bears managed to restrict their hosts to 40 off the first 10 overs. At that same point during their time on the crease, the Bears had recorded 59 runs, though with the loss of both openers.
The Bears breakthrough came in the 21st over when wicketkeeper, Jones, stumped Boyce (36) off Davis’ bowling.
For the five overs that followed, Warwickshire enjoyed a good harvest of their hosts’ wickets. Anisha Patel and Jenny Gunn were partners in crime.
Patel bowled with Gunn taking the catch for the dismissal of Yvonne Graves and Jodie Dibble. Nottinghamshire were left 80 for four after 25 overs. Captain Sonia Odedra had earlier been ran out by Laura Crofts.
The Bears had fun under the beautiful sun, displaying some remarkable fielding in defence of their total.
Coaches Errol Simms and Alex Roslyn watched anxiously the nail-biting finish that saw the hosts escape defeat with a whisker.
“The team fought really hard throughout and were very nearly rewarded with the win that we deserved,” said Rosslyn.
“We can take a lot from the performance and know that our first win is just around the corner if we keep working hard.”