LAST Saturday's match at the Rigbys between Bradshaw and Greenmount was one of those games that, unfortunately, died the death in spite of a lot of very good cricket having been played writes Peter Stafford

Andy Bowker and Gary Chadwick got the visitors away to an excellent start, but it was Nigel Franklyn's unbeaten 36 that lifted the side's total from good to very good. Bradshaw brought pressure on themselves with a fairly slow start, not helped by Wingfield's first over dismissal, and the brilliant run-out of Dave Morris by the Greenmount professional just about condemned the game to a draw.

Since he began bowling regularly in first-team cricket, young Ryan Senior has developed the useful habit of dismissing good players, and, on Saturday, having already included O'Rourke, Dublin, Tebay and Dalugoda in his lengthening list, he took the valuable wickets of Andy Kerr and Neil Johnson to ensure the lion's share of the points.

It was a day of achievement, too, for Dave Smith, over at Walkden. His first two wickets, those of Social Circle's Ashworth and Murphy, took him on to the "500-list", while other recent landmarks include those of Mike Ward and Tim Barry, who have topped 5,000 runs, and wicket-keeper Christian Walsh who, when he caught Steve Dublin in the second game of the season, brought his tally up to the 200 necessary for inclusion in the list of leading wicket keepers.

On Sunday I took in Clifton's home game against Blackrod and, for the second time this season, was hugely impressed by the batting of Andy Griffiths, whose undefeated 79 was easily the highlight of the day. Andy is just one of the batsmen who could cause trouble for the Bolton League's bowlers in Monday's Trinity Cup match at Piggott Park. Three others, it has to be said, are the trio of pro's selected by the Association, Bazid Khan, Ijaz Mahmood and Ari Sarkar, who, at the time of writing, have aggregated somewhere in the region of 3,500 runs. Against that, of course, the League's three selections, Klinger, Nisar and Morris, are not exactly short of runs, all of which would seem to indicate that both bowling attacks will have their work cut out. It's good to see Dale Jones being given his chance, and he, presumably, will open the bowling with club colleague Jon Fearick unless skipper Dave Morris opts to give the new ball to either of his two namesakes.

I wrote earlier in the season of the prolific form being shown by the three Morris's, and now here they all are, in the same side. The nearest the Association could come up with is John Norris, the Darcy Lever and former Social Circle wicket keeper, who currently has more victims than any other keeper in the two leagues.

In this, the 33rd match in the series, the Association will be keen to claw back the deficit which currently stands at 20-

10 in the League's favour, or 19-10, depending upon which of the two Handbooks you consult! What is generally agreed is that two of the ties were ruined by rain, something we all earnestly hope will not be the case on Monday! The game gets under way at 1pm.