Goole Town 2’s, had a very young and inexperience team on Saturday as they hosted Heworth at Westfield. After winning the toss and deciding to bowl Goole skipper Anthony Gibbins new that an early breakthrough was needed. Unfortunately a 108 run partnership from Ford (80) and Lawrence (30) gave Goole the exact opposite and the Goole bowling attack was unable to stem the flow of runs enough to hold Heworth to a chaseable total with such an inexperience batting line up that Goole had to work with. Heworth scored well to progress to 192-3 from 45 overs, with Tom Marritt impressing again with 1-32, Josh Tooke 1-14 and Steve Hicks chipping in with 1-47 from 12 overs. Two good catches from Tom Franks were highlights for Goole, but after the innings, Goole knew that they had a tough task ahead with the bat.

Goole in reply got off the worst possible start as skipper Gibbins played a rash shot, which went straight up in the air and ended in the keepers gloves to leave Goole on 10-1. Tom Franks and is Dad, Simon, batted well to take Goole to 50-1, when the latter inside edged a ball on to his stumps to be bowled for 24 and Tom went a few balls later as he was caught by Huffner for 11. Ryan Thompson showed promise with a brisk 17 from 14 balls, but he was also caught by Huffner from the experienced bowling of Buckton to leave Goole struggling on 68-4. Chappell, Steele, Murphy and Wood all followed not long after as Goole slumped to 94-8, but a good partnership from Steve Hicks (46 from 35 balls) and Josh Tooke (16 not out) threatened to drag Goole back into contention, but not long after, Hicks was well caught by Ford and Marritt was bowled for a duck as Goole were bowled out for 147.

The 2s promising start to the season and momentum in June and July has unfortunately now gone and with three defeats and a rained off match in August it has all but ended the chances of promotion this year. Player unavailability has cost the 2s this season and it is a shame that the youngsters such as Marritt, Franks and Murphy are not quite ready to allow the 2s to push on and challenge for promotion in 2019. Next season is potentially the year for the 2s to progress and the positive performances that we have seen in 2019 will go a long way to blooding the youngsters and giving them the valuable experience that is needed to challenge for silverware.

Next week Goole travel to Bishopthorpe, which is now a mid-table clash, but one that should be a close and competitive game.