CRICKET: Smith ton maintains good Oakridge start (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Cotswold & District Cricket Association Division One round-up

10:34am Tuesday 22nd May 2012 in Sport

OAKRIDGE maintained their good start to the season with a comfortable home win against Barnsley. Despite being without the prolific Mark Robbins, the hosts posted a competitive 176-6, with M Smith hitting 104, backed up by opening partner Tim Hawkins who scored 43.

For the visitors, the main wicket-taker was George Corbett with 3-31.

Barnsley never really got going and lost wickets at regular intervals. Only Jon Maunder, batting unusually low in the order, put significant runs on the board with 39.

Richard Minchin bowled a mean opening spell with 3-13 off his ten overs. Stuart Ridge cleaned up with 4-25 as the visitors were bowled out for only 114 in the 34th over.

At NATS, newly-promoted Oaksey were invited to bat and found it tough to score against accurate bowling from Griffiths on a slow wicket. Nevertheless at 68-0 after 23 overs a competitive total looked on the cards.

However, a sharp burst from Varun Sharma (3-28), with three wickets in nine balls, changed the course of the game. First to go was opener Toby Horton who scored a promising 55*. At 69-4, the visitors had to re-group and a fine partnership between Rob Stinchcombe 31* and Dan Horton 28 allowed them to reach 135-6 after 40 overs.

This total might have been defendable with accurate bowling and three wickets from Ken Lane (3-21) gave Oaksey some hope. Despite decent bowling and plenty of close shaves, the one loose ball per over cost Oaksey dear.

Opener Stuart Phillips dug in with 38* and was joined by Varun Sharma, who punished the bad ball severely to finish on 61. The total was reached in the 36th over.

It was a similar score but a much tighter game at Chedworth where the hosts, last year’s runners-up, posted 130 all out, young Oliver Lockey top-scoring with 36.

Visiting skipper Gideon Long took 4-22 and veteran Bob Parker 3-36 to leave Windrush with what looked like a comfortable target. The run rate was always good, however wickets fell at regular intervals and when opener Gideon Long was fifth out for 53 with the score on 97-5 it suddenly became a nail-biter.

Excellent bowling from John Watson with 4-5 from 6.1 overs took Chedworth to the brink of an unlikely victory, but Keen with some late runs looked to have secured an away win only to be caught with the scores level. The last pair scraped the required run to give Windrush the narrowest of victories.

The match at Sherston was another low-scoring affair. The hosts, having been inserted, were all out for 105 with only vice-captain James Harmer (38) getting significant runs.

For visiting Stow the wickets were shared with Seb Bevan taking 4-21 and Jack Robson 3-34.

Stow batted solidly and reached the target comfortably with Max Fisher finishing on 48* and skipper Ash Andrews 33* at the end.

The match between Williamstrip and Adlestrop was cancelled due to continued problems with waterlogging.