Hucknall looking forward to ‘yardstick test’ by Radcliffe-on-Trent

Radcliffe were unlikely leaders until last weekend and, after a heavy eight-wicket defeat by Cavaliers & Carrington last Saturday, Johnson said Radcliffe were a much better benchmark of what his should and could aspire to.

“It will be a really good challenge,” he said.

“Radcliffe have this year maybe done slightly better than they expected. “Fair play to them, they have found a way to win and a formula that works.

“If I am being honest they are the kind of team that teams like us need to be looking up to and aspiring to be like.

“They have grown organically over a few years and their players produce. They are a benchmark for where we want to be.

“So I am looking forward to seeing it first hand and challenging ourselves against them.

“We have beaten Kimberley and Cuckney this year so there is no reason why we can't beat Radcliffe.”

Asked to bat on Saturday, Hucknall were 87 all out, Sam King top-scoring with 24 and Zain Ramza taking 3-2, Fateh Singh 3-14 and Nayyar Abbas 3-19.

After being 6-2, Cavaliers then knuckled down and Adam Tillcock (39 not out) and Rehan Ahmed (35 not out) eased them home.

“The wicket they produced suited their very good bowling attack with four really high class spinners. Each of them bowled really well,” said Johnson.

“It was disappointing but as I have said over the summer, games like this have never been the ones than define our season.

“Obviously it would have been nice to play better and do better. But we were just outclassed on the day really.”

Hucknall will again be without professional Sol Budinger this weekend and Johnson said: “Looks like we will be going with one pro again this Saturday with Sol Budinger preparing for his game for Notts next Wednesday.

“We will be as strong as we can be for what we've got available.

“We have played nearly the whole season with only one pro which has been frustrating for us. It's good for Sol as it means he is doing really well for Notts.

“We are split. We're delighted for him and would like to think the early season runs he got with us has helped him to achieve what he wanted to achieve.

“But selfishly you wonder where we could have ended up if we'd had a full season with him.”