With pre match talk revolving around Ed's century and the state of Jon's ringer, the essence of victory was once again in the air. We entered the field vassed up and a man down.

The bowling started well with some good opening spells from Jon Smith and Anth Barrett. And by the look on Jon's face every ball was taking him to an inch of his pain threshold. Although under pressure, the MOD's opening pair held on for some time and put a few runs on the board.

HOB's bowling continued to be tight with some excellent fielding to back up the line and length bowling. Young William Thomas bowled particularly well and was very unlucky not to take wickets, the only wickets taken by Ashford (1-20) and Adams (2-17). MOD's finished on a respectable 124 for 3.

With a quiet air of confidence the Old Boys padded up. The skipper had gone for an unconventional but solid batting line up and you could feel the confidence in the air (or was that just the smoke coming from No.5 Filton Ave).

Well, about 30 minutes later and it was 38 for 7 off 9 over's, Adams and Ashford the only batsmen to reach double figures. In came the big boys, smash, smash , smash and the MOD'S were no longer smiling and joking - SJ Smith making 38 not out and W Thomas making 36 not out and reaching the total with 2 overs to spare.

A pleasure to watch!

HOB's not the only winners, so was cricket.