The Upper Airedale Junior Association’s under-12 team suffered a narrow defeat against the Nidderdale Junior Association at Steeton.

Thomas Meakin was the captain of the Upper Airedale team in the absence of Danny Murphy, and were put in after Nidderdale won the toss and elected to field.

Upper Airedale lost an early wicket with Waseem Qureshi out for four at 17-1 but Meakin and James Robinson put on a good stand of 27.

Thomas was then bowled by spinner Eddleston (the first of his first of his three wickets) and 11 more runs were added to take the score to 55 before Robinson was bowled by Eddlestone.

The latter then dismissed Harry Farnell with a good ball to make it 59-4 but this only brought Joe Hall to the crease and, with Adil Modak, they added 61 before Hall, who hit seven boundaries, was sadly run out for 29.

Modak finished unbeaten on 36 as the innings closed on 138-5, which Upper Airedale’s managers were not unhappy with.

Then tight early bowling by the hosts kept the visitors’ run rate below the asking rate, and it stayed that way for the best part of the match.

Nidderdale’s score was 35 after ten overs and 76-6 after 20.

It looked like Upper Airedale wre going to repeat last year’s under-11 victory against Nidderdale when Hall backed up his good batting with a five-over spell of three wickets for 11 runs, and he also effected a run out.

However, T Cant batted very strongly in the last ten overs, finishing on 38 not out and bringing Nidderdale home with ten balls of the innings remaining at 142 for seven.