Hucknall rocked by rain-affected result against Radcliffe-on-Trent

Wazeem Fazal - 99 seventh wicket partnership with Josh Bembridge.

“We feel like we got the rough end of it last weekend,” said captain Sam Johnson.

“We thought we played the better cricket for 80 per cent of the overs and ended up on the losing side.

“It was really frustrating. I was really happy with the lads in terms of how we went about batting only for the rain to then intervene and make them clear favourites.”

Hucknall made 247-6, Robin Maxwell with 55 and Waseem Fazal (47 not out) and Josh Bembridge (49 not out) putting on 99 runs for the seventh wicket.

Vinay Landa and Nolan Benson both added 34 apiece.

But rain saw title-chasing Radcliffe set a Duckworth-Lewis target of 101 in 11 overs and finished with 103-3 in9.3 overs.

“Duckworth-Lewis is generally a pretty good method, but it felt frustrating that they had their total they had to get off 11 overs and it didn't matter how many wickets we took, that total stayed the same,” said Johnson.

“Every ball for them felt like a free hit to be honest.

“The lads in general batted well. We started really well with the bat. We had a tough spell in the middle losing three quick wickets, then we finished really well with the bat.

“The seventh wicket partnership was really good to watch – they played really well.”

Hucknall are almost certain to stay up and, ahead of Saturday's trip to Clifrton Village, he said: “I think we need a single point from the next two games to guarantee it but we are still waiting on the decision from the Premier League on the two games we missed through Covid.

“If we are awarded average points I don't think we'll be miles away from already being safe.

“We had games against Caythorpe and Plumtree called off as we had a Covid outbreak in our squad.

“The league are now basically deciding how to award the points for those fixtures.

“Obviously the other teams are saying they should have all the points but we said we think it's an average points situation like every other Covid postponement has been.

“Either way we are really not far away from staying up.”