Devon Cricket League 2nd XI B division west

Kingsbridge II XI 179,

Cornwood III XI 184-6;

Cornwood (19 points) beat Kingsbridge (seven)

by four wickets

Two days of heavy rain made the toss important to win; in the event Cornwood won and put Kings in to bat on a damp wicket.

Last week's centurion John Hardy and captain Clive Clark opened the batting.

Much the same as last week, Hardy was free scoring, but that came to an end in the seventh over when he was caught on 28.

This brought in Eddie Church, who was seeing the ball well; extras were the top score and Church added to that.

Just before drinks the score was 86-1 and Kings were going well on a difficult batting wicket, but in one over there was a run out Clark for 15 and back-to-back half century boy George Holland fell in 22nd over.

After drinks Church and Edmonds added three runs to the score before Church fell on 21.

This brought young Steve Inch back to fill a spot and it looked like he has never missed a game.

In the 30th over Ed­monds was bowled with a daisy cutter with the score on 109, so in came Hammett to help Inch make more runs.

They both tried to score quickly to make sure the Cornwood bowler could not settle, something they both did well as they took the score past 150 looking to get up to 200.

That did not happen as Hammett was bowled for a well-earned 26 and a partnership of 53.

The very next over Inch was out for a great 36, followed by Churcher for four and Mike Perkin for nine, leaving Aaron Chand­ler one not out and Kings finished on 179.

In reply Cornwood knew it would be hard to score runs easily seeing as the wicket didn't dry out like they thought it would.

Kings had a great start as Ham­mett and Edmonds opened the bowling again and bowled well.

In the fifth over Edmonds bowled the Cornwood opener and two overs later Ham­mett struck, finding the edge of the other opening batsman.

Then what happened next was a freak over that you would never see.

Edmond bowled a wide full toss which was hit straight to midwicket and was gobbled up by Churcher.

Two balls later he bowled another wide full toss and was hit in the air to the covers, which was taken well by Church, then the last ball the batsman tickled one to short fine leg and he tried to take a single, which was a big mistake as Hammett picked up the ball and hit the stumps.

Three wickets in one over was nuts and the score was 22-5, but what happened next was not funny for the Kings.

The two new batsmen didn't take too long to add 80 to the score at 122-5 before Ed Church took a wicket and Kings thought they were back on track.

However, two dropped catches were to prove costly as the visitors flew past Kings' 179. Picking up seven points was enough to leap frog South Devon, who lost their match, leaving Kings seven points clear of South Devon and this week's opponents Plymouth in the relegation zone.

Kings second team's next home game is in two weeks against Yelverton.

Devon Cricket League 1st XI C division west

Babbacombe 64 all out,

Kingsbridge 102 all out

Babbacombe (five points) lost to Kings­bridge (16) by 38 runs

Kingsbridge travelled to the 'Bowl' for their first league game there for many years.

Historically a low-scoring game, Saturday was to prove no different.

The pitch had been covered due to the previous day's rain but some had leaked through on a length.

Put into bat, Kings­bridge began patiently. Runs were difficult to score and Westlake went to one that cut back and kept low.

An unfortunate run out saw Bradbury go with the total on 37. Carr (26) again looked to be approaching top form, but when he was out on 53 things got worse quickly.

The pitch was getting harder to play and wickets tumbled. 81 for 8 didn't look good. Peach joined Rose­warne (19) and they took the total along to 102 before both perished.

At tea Kingsbridge knew 102 was on the low side, but competitive with a good bowling performance, which have been in short supply.

However, as Peach had been saying all week: 'I always take wickets at Babba­combe.'

Opening the bowling into a wet patch on a length, Peach was immmediately difficult to play.

Moving the ball both ways, he saw three wickets in his first three overs thanks to some particularly good catching, Dorey removing Kingdom to a steepler first ball, and general good fielding.

Wickets tumbled as 5 for 3 became 21 for 5.

Peach finished his spell of nine overs with 5 for 18.

Pugh top scored with 23, only to be removed by Rosewarne on his reintroduction into the attack as his bowling 'mojo' returned.

It was fitting that a superb catch by Bridg­ens finished the game with Babbacombe all out for 64. Rosewarne finished with figures of 3 for 20.

The match ball was sponsored by Palla­dium builders.