Merchants’ beat RGS Newcastle to become North of England Champions

The Merchant Taylors’ Under 15 cricket team continued its impressive run in the ESCA Cup on Friday by defeating RGS Newcastle on their own patch thanks to an impressive performance with both bat and ball.

Having lost the toss Merchants were invited to bat first on a good looking pitch and despite losing Jackson Darkes-Sutcliffe in the first over the other early batsmen began to build a good start to the innings. The Rankin twins took the score to 50 before the second wicket fell, and the next partnership between Robert Rankin (64) and George Politis (57) really set the foundation for a good score. With wickets in hand the boys were able to really attack the bowling in the closing stages and Merchants ended with a very challenging total of 200 from the 40 allocated overs.

Although the Newcastle boys got off to a fast start their innings faltered against the mean bowling of Jackson Darkes-Sutcliffe (1 for 18 from 8 overs) and Robert Rankin (1 for 8 from 6 overs). These two forced the required run rate up to a level where Newcastle had to take considerable risks to win the game, and against Oliver Green and Harvey Rankin that was never going to be an easy task. Both of them finished with 4 wickets from their spells as Newcastle were dismissed for 101.

This is the first time in its history that a Merchant Taylors’ team has gone so deep into a national competition. It is a credit to the boys and their coaches that they have done so well. They are also through to the quarter final of the Lancashire T20 Cup following an eight wicket win against St Mary’s School last week.