With their hopes of one-day success extinguished, Bedfordshire's focus will turn to the remainder of their MCCA Championship Eastern Division campaign.

The county, in stark contrast to the limited overs game, have struggled badly in their opening two fixtures and will be looking for a significant improvement over their last four outings.

The first of those is on Sunday when they make the short trip to Bishop's Stortford to face Hertfordshire.

Their opponents are currently sitting in fourth place in the table after a solitary game that saw them thump Cumberland by nine wickets.
As has been the case for the previous two three-day outings, Beds are likely to field a depleted line-up with the problem of unavailability to the fore.

One bonus for Beds is that school teachers James Knott and Ollie Clayson are likely to be available for the rest of the summer, but it is in the bowling ranks where Andy Roberts believes the difficulties lie.

He continued: "The batting isn't too bad, but its getting the bowlers where the problem is.

"The sides with the strongest bowling attacks are always there or thereabouts and you want to put out as strong an attack as you can.

"It's like club cricket, but magnified because there aren't the bowlers you need out there."

While the county have benefited from the addition of a number of Northants Academy players, clashes in fixtures with the Second XI Championship mean that there could be further players missing.

Speaking about the issue, Roberts added: "Dave Ripley (Northants coach] has been good about letting us have some players, there's a strong link there.

"But Northants seconds have a few more games this time of year and that will make a difference.

"The likes of Tom Brett and Dan Bendon, who are part of the team, will be away."