The 2’s had named a reasonably strong side, featuring debuts for David “Calamity’’ James and Chris Reid, and the return of Rich Drewett to the 2’s side, but were missing Mark Collings and Sohaib Asghar who were both called up to the 1’s.Still there were lots of bowling options for skipper Hammer, a luxury not always at his disposal. Hammer won the toss and invited Mufs to bat, with conditions slightly overcast.

Where Pakistan once had the fearsome pace duo of Wasim and Waqar, the 2’s opened the bowling with the equally fearsome duo of Hall and Hammer. And right from the word go, the pressure was on Mufs with both Hall and Hammer bowling tightly and not giving anything away, but neither could make the initial breakthrough, though not for lack of trying. Finally the first breakthrough came when Drewett bowled the Mufs opener with 29 runs on the board. But still the Mufs batsmen clung in there – while not scoring runs at any great speed, there was always the nagging doubt that at some point with wickets in hand, they would surely look to push the score on. Maybe they were being mindful of the fact that in their first two outings this season they had scored 59 and 100.

Drewett drew second blood and Mufs were 60 for 2. David James, on debut, finally got his man thanks to a great catch at slip from Hall and Mufs were 65 for 3. However by this stage, with the thunder, lightning and rain all around, both sides left the field of play, having stayed on in increasingly worsening conditions, with the score on 73 for 3 off 32 overs, and an early tea was taken.

The rain abated and the game restarted, and it was the turn of the youngsters in the team to show what they could do. Jazim Sohail took the first wicket after the resumption and then Andrew Wilcock chipped in with the next two, but Mufs had progressed to 91 for 6 by then. Finally Mufs threw caution to the wind (and rain, thunder and lightning) and threw everything but the proverbial kitchen sink at the Livingston bowlers, and running singles hard, finishing on 135 for 8 off 45 overs, with Hammer on a hat-trick for his first ball of the next match. Towards the end of the Mufs innings the rain had started again, and this made bowling that much more difficult, and the Kingfishers found the fielding conditions increasingly difficult underfoot, as Senior Wilcock found out to his cost when he lost his footing and stretched a wee bit too far, ouch!

Pick of the bowlers was Drewett with 2 for 13 off his 9 overs, with contributions from Hammer 2 for 28, and Silky Wilcock 2 for 24, but all the bowlers contributed. A target of 136 looked a good recovery considering where Mufs had been after coming off for the rain – but the Kingfishers must feel that they let initiative slip away from them in the last ten overs.

Unfortunately, that was the last of the action, as the rain came down heavier and both Captains agreed to call the game off.

The game was played in good spirits but sadly it was a case of another year, another washed out game at Roseburn – let’s hope when we play Mufs again later in the season back at Dresselrigg, we can play a full game! Next up for the 2s are Pencuik 3’s at home.