Cricket- County Division Four (East)

Tideford v St Erme

Tideford are having their fair share of injuries and players unable to play. Beaten for a first time in the League last weekend, this weekend alone saw six different second team players used over the two games and two more bowlers injured. With Lockett and Osborne (44 wkts between them) unavailable it was left to Geach (the only other bowler to complete 50 overs this season) to lead the attack.

St Erme progressed well initially with Trethewey and Wilcock striking the ball confidently to the boundary at regular intervals. At 95 for 2 in the 20th over, a target in excess of 200 was envisaged. The turning point came in the 21st over when Trethewey was well caught by Griffin on the mid-wicket boundary for 33. Wilcock continued for a while until he too was caught for 37.

Mark Peachey in his third game this season had a good spell of spin bowling and is looking to be a more than useful all-rounder. Danny Copp is the 'Devon Malcolm' of Tideford as his short spel] included the following sequence... wide, wide, wicket, four, wide, wicket, wide. St Erme's batting maintained a steady run-rate but once Trethewey and Wilcock had departed the remaining wickets fell at regular intervals. The innings came to a premature end in the 35th over for a disappointing 156.

Tideford progressed to 30 for 1 before tea was taken and a further wicket fell on the resumption of play without a run being added. A stand of 38 then followed between Luiten and Geach which pushed the score onto 68 before Geach was smartly caught at mid-off by Hathaway diving forward (yes diving) to position both hands between the ball and ground.

Pearson opened the bowling and soon found the ideal line and length and troubled every batsman, changing from over to round the wicket and back again in an attempt to find the edge or hit the stumps. Bowling his 16 overs right through, he only conceded 22 runs, (14 scoring strokes) beating the bat on countless times and picked up 2 wickets. A 5 wicket haul would have been more appropriate for his efforts.

At 75 for 5 the balance was tilting towards the bowling side. Peachey and Lister knew this and set out to, first consolidate their position, then attempt the win. Wisely they realised Pearson was the one bowler who could do some damage to the tail and quite rightly batted hirn out of the game. In reality it was more like missing him out of the game.

By now the required run-rate was creeping up to five an over and the result could have gone either way until Peachey decided enough was enough and launched Hathaway for two sixes in consecutive overs. Mark Lister played a major part in this victory as he stuck with Peachey to the end and actually out-scored him to register another knock in the 40's. It seemed on paper Tideford had comfortably won by five wickets, both teams will testify it was a lot closer.

Scores - St Erme 156 (K Trethewey 33, D Gay 16, K Wilcock 37, D Wilkinson 12, A Wilkinson 10; W Geach 7-1-29-1, D Bradbeer 6-0-22-1, M Peachey 11.5-0-60-4, S Bradbeer 7-2-18-1, D Copp 3-0-9-3).

Tideford (20) bt St Erme (5) by five wickets.