Gloucestershire County Cricket League Division One

Cirencester 176 all out

Tetbury 152 all out

Cirencester won by 24 runs

CIRENCESTER carried on their strong early season form in division one of the Bank House-sponsored county league with a 24 run victory over local rivals Tetbury at Cirencester park.

Tetbury won the toss and elected to bowl first on a pitch which following the heavy rain on Wednesday was still holding some moisture under the surface and likely to offer early seam movement.

Gareth Williams (24) and Jamie.Jamieson-Black (52) managed to negate any movement and provide a solid base to the innings, putting on 51 runs for the first wicket before Williams was bowled by Alex Evans (1-36) trying to pull a ball that didn’t bounce as much as expected.

Ben Moody (0) fell quickly after; LBW to Mike Baverstock (2-30) again playing across the line on a slow low track proving his downfall. This brought to the crease new Zimbabwean recruit Campbell Saul (23), Jamieson-Black and Saul proceeded to put the Tetbury bowlers under pressure and their running between the wickets was dynamic as they added 44 runs for the 3rd wicket. Jamieson-Black was eventually LBW to Baverstock soon after raising his bat for his half century and Saul followed soon after.

With the introduction of spin from both ends and wickets falling at too regular intervals, the run rate was slowing every over and Cirencester were in danger of not getting a par score. There was a welcome return for Paul Godding (32), playing his first game in 15 years for Cirencester after plying his trade for local sides Lechlade and Cheltenham who along with Andy Reynolds (14*) managed to get the innings up to a respectable 176.

Being bowled out in the 44th over was a source of frustration for the hosts, the spinners inflicting most of the damage - Tom Horrell (4-32) and James Meacham (3-24).

Tetbury had all the momentum heading into the second half with Cirencester left feeling they should have made 30-40 more runs considering the base they had, however results from the 2015 season proved that 170 was always a competitive score at the park.

It was important for town to get early wickets to stem any early momentum from the hosts and Billy Breen delivered an accurate off stump Yorker to remove James Westhead (0), Tom Horrell (16) fell 4 overs later and this brought about a period of consolidation for the visitors, the game quickly turned into a question of who would blink first.

Mike Baverstock (13) was the next to go caught by Williams at mid-off off Campbell Saul (1-19), following a period of tight bowling from the hosts, however at 60-3 the visitors were still in with a chance of winning.

James Meacham (40) was proving the biggest thorn in the side and was the Tetbury player to play with most fluency hitting the bad ball to the fence, but when Tom Fullalove (4-32) was brought back into the attack the pressure was growing and resulted in 7 catches in the innings coming from release shots.

With the run rate getting to 8 an over the fielders were on their toes, exemplified by a brilliant run out from Andy Reynolds fielding at mid-wicket who with one stump to aim at inflicted a direct hit.

Captain Gareth Williams (3-25) came back on to mop up the tail which he did in the 44th over, next week sees Cirencester in a top of the table clash against last season’s strongest rivals Westbury-On-Severn.