Seconds clinch promotion (report below)

Dartington & Totnes II 261 for 8 Abbotskerswell III 118 all out

Dartington & Totnes (20 points) beat Abbotskerswell (5 points) by 143 runs.

D&T second XI clinched promotion with a comprehensive victory over Abbotskerswell at Stover School on Saturday.   D&T have not enjoyed much success in recent times playing on the synthetic pitch at Stover.   The track is usually a batsman’s paradise and makes the bowlers struggle.  On this occasion it was the umpire who had greatest difficulty as following a shower of rain the astroturf strip became inundated with flying ants.  There were frequent interruptions during Abbotskerwell’s innings to divest umpire Darren Colegate of the biting creatures.

Put in to bat D&T got off to a fine start with Mike Jarvis leading the way.  His opening partner Neil Colegate adopted the anchor role as Jarvis scored largely in boundaries.  The score rattled along nicely with a plethora of wides boosting the run rate.  Jarvis had hit 6 fours and a fine straight driven six before he holed out to mid-off for 37, with the score on 70.  Neil Colegate was joined by brother Scott and upped his run rate.   The brothers put on an invaluable 107 for the second wicket before Scott was caught off Abbots skipper Karl Beasant for 42.  Neil was caught off the veteran, Tomlinson (4 for 40) for 57 leaving D&T in an extremely strong position on 199 with 10 overs remaining.  Tom Petherick hit a cameo 25 with only six scoring shots including 3 fours and 2 sixes.  This heralded a mid-order collapse as four wickets went down for 8 runs in an overly frantic attempt for quick runs, with the batsman playing like lemmings.  Nick Dennis, batting at nine, in a brief rain shower, stopped the rot, scoring 22 not out with some clean hitting.

After tea Umpire Colegate bewildered the players with some bizarre hand signals as it became apparent that the whole strip was covered in tiny creatures, of which he bore the brunt of the attack.

Abbotskerswell had already beaten D&T this season but were fielding an understrength side and D&T got off to a dream start with both Abbots openers out for ducks.  Scott Colegate was bowling with pace and movement and found Karl Beasant’s outside edge in his first over as brother Gavin took a fine catch at slip.  Nick Dennis bowled Jack Tomlinson in his first over to rock Abbots. Dennis then trapped Reilly lbw for 5 and Scott bowled Hannis-Smith for 11, reducing Abbots to 28 for 4.

Nick Morgan was undaunted and was soon counterattacking and forcing the field to spread out.  Dennis (3 for 37) bowled Penberthy for a duck and Scott Colegate (3 for 40) bowled Styles for 4.  Morgan reached his 50 but did not last long after that holing out to Scott Colegate at mid-wicket, off Mudge.  There followed some spirited resistance from the tail, in particular from Glyn Penrice who, coming out of retirement to play, enjoyed himself scoring 10.  Josh Thomas (3 for 20) cleaned up the tail as D&T romped home with over 12 overs to spare.

D&T are now 3 points ahead of Ashburton who they play next week in a title decider.

Comments are closed.