Thirds lose despite Mick’s highest League score in 13 years: Report

Dartington & Totnes III 149 all out, Yelverton III 153 for 4

Yelverton (20 points) beat D&T (4 points) by 6 wickets.

With a shortage of experience bowlers D&T skipper Paul Raven elected to bat on a damp green track.  The plan soon backfired as D&T were quickly reduced to 63 for 6.  Cliff Lowe hit a boundary but missed the next ball. Neil Colegate had hit 47 not out for the second team on the previous week and he was answering an SOS since the thirds had no recognised keeper.  However, he found the track much more difficult than the batsmen’s paradise he had encountered at Ashburton and succumbed for 10.  Chris Roud was lbw to a delivery which seemed to be going down the legside- much to his chagrin. Gareth Havard scored 14, Darren Colegate stuck around without troubling the scorers too much before being dismissed by a fine slip catch.  Paul Raven and Jonty Coles were soon out too and D&T were 86 for 7 after 24 overs.  Mick Rusling joined  Nick Carter who is a bit of a swashbuckler.  Carter swashbuckled to 23 before being bowled by an unplayable delivery which failed to bounce.  Young Sam Tanner came in and put on 36 valuable runs with Rusling for the 9th wicket. Tanner scored 21 batting with a mixture of patience and aggression and was unphased by the precarious situation.   Rusling with 4 fours in his  21 not out* took the score up to 149- a run away from a further batting point before Ed Coles was caught at silly mid off.

*It was Mick’s highest League score for  thirteen years.

The tail had wagged effectively and given D&T a chance of victory.   After tea Gareth Havard opened the bowling and found the batsmen’s edge three times in his first over as two catches to gully were not held.  It didn’t matter because his opening partner, Mick Rusling (3 for 27), took three wickets in his first 8 deliveries.  He took 2 in his first over with Lowe and Raven taking catches and then is his next over Jonty Coles took a fine catch at mid-wicket.  However, the fourth wicket pair proved harder to dislodge with Payne batting very well and passed his fifty.  Ed Coles bowled well without success before Raven picked up  a wicket. However,  Payne and Yelverton skipper Paul Farnham saw Yelverton home to a deserved victory with plenty of overs to spare.

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