REED were unable to maintain their National Village Cup momentum as they crashed out at the hands of North Mymms on Sunday. Despite going agonisingly close to beating the Herts County Premier League team, Reed failed to emulate last season s success by bo

REED were unable to maintain their National Village Cup momentum as they crashed out at the hands of North Mymms on Sunday.

Despite going agonisingly close to beating the Herts County Premier League team, Reed failed to emulate last season's success by booking their place in the regional final.

The Division 2 side fielded first on a pitch that was perfectly suited to batting, which North Mymms demonstrated with C Stead (34) and K Claxton (38) making life difficult for Graham Wilson (8-0-40-0).

The signs looked ominous for Reed, until Chris Jackson (9-1-30-3) joined William Clarke (9-0-29-2) to put the brakes on the run rate by bowling accurate spin and seam deliveries to send Bamford and Claxton packing on 111-3.

Their partnership continued to thwart North Mymms, although S Clements grafted a sensible 36 not out, and Reed did their best to stop their opponents building a strong total , with North Mymms finishing on 189-7 off 40 overs.

Confident they could chase the total, their hopes were dashed by the early loss of Baz Curtis (7) and captain James Heslam (15).

On 33-2, Chris Jackson (11) and Richard Johnson tried to stabilise, but both played lazy shots to be caught and stumped.

Two subsequent run outs left Reed reeling on 84-6 off 21 overs, with Tom Fulk (54) still in place, but as S Jackson (1) also fell early, it was left to Karl Ward to maintain the required run rate.

However, North Mymms' excellent bowling and fielding made this difficult, and eventually Reed went down by 11 runs.

Reed captain James Heslam said: "It's always a shame to get knocked out of the cup, especially after our successes over recent seasons, but North Mymms played well, and on the day we simply folded.

"On another day I'm confident we would have done better. At least we can now pour all our energies into the league.