Bank Holiday Monday saw our Junior A Boys away at Mount Temple for an early start under sunny skies against Clontarf.

We lost the toss and the home side decided to bat first, and started slowly due to a wet and long outfield, but things speeded up with their numbers 3, 4 and 5 scoring 80 odd between them. They scored 104 in total off the bat and we gave them another 24 in extras.

128 looked about par, so Jack and James opened without needing to panic early on. We found it hard to score (again) and had only reached 15 after 6 overs, but once Aaron came in and faced 12 balls to retire on 36 - we were back on track needing a run-a-ball from here to win.

Mitch, Matthew, Sean and Charlie all tried hard and got 50 odd between them, but the run rate kept creeping up.

We needed 31 off the last 2. We got 15 runs in the 19th over, leaving us 16 to win off the last. Valiant effort by Sean and Charlie, but alas, we fell 4 runs short.

There are so many places that 4 run difference could have been saved. Sure, there was a contentious call for 4 byes by the square leg umpire which met with surprise by our chasing fielders, but parking that to one side - our fielding let us down this time. There were 2 instances of "ball through the legs" for four. We dropped four catches - one was very difficult, but one was dropped over the rope for 6 too. But 24 extras including 17 wides was the difference that lost us this game.

Nice to see 2 pairs of brothers in our team with Malahide Minor Mitch joining Captain Jack on the field and also a first run out in the Junior A's for Mark Doyle who showed great ability and sharp hands in the field.

Thanks for all the parents who watched the game and to Stephanie for doing the scoring.

Just one game left for the Junior A's away at Pembroke on the 17th.