BROADSTONE II 184 (19) beat WEYMOUTH 155 (8) by 29 runs

WEYMOUTH captain Simon Browne felt his side were beaten by the better team as the hosts fell to a 29-run defeat against Broadstone Seconds yesterday at Redlands.

Despite bowling the visitors out for 184 with two overs to spare, Weymouth felt confident they could chase down the total from their 45 overs.

But none of their batsman could make any serious inroads into the total as they were bowled out for 155.

It is the second week in a row that the batsmen have not been able to go on and make a big score, something which isn’t lost on the captain.

He said: “We had a strong batting line-up, but no-one really got going. Their opening bowler was very good and he took some early wickets.

“It was disappointing and it felt like a carbon-copy of last week against Bere Regis where they didn’t bat as well as they should have done and we did much the same this week.

“We needed someone to take charge, hit the runs and get us over the line, but that didn’t happen this week.”

It was the first game of the season for Weymouth on their home pitch and Browne decided to bowl first and it seemed a good decision as Graham Puckett broke through to remove Simon Wildbur in the second over of the day with Dean Janaway taking the catch.

Fellow opener Greg Parsons took the game to Weymouth in the opening exchanges, anchoring the innings with a good knock of 47.

He had numerous partners in his innings as Weymouth were able to take wickets at regular intervals.

Captain Browne trapped Tom Prest in front for seven, Puckett caught Rob Wallis off the bowling of Joe James to reduce the visitors to 84-3.

That quickly turned into 87-4 as Lee Craven was dismissed for three as Dave Pearce snaffled his first victim thanks to a catch from Michael Pearce.

Sam Beer (7) and Parsons were then out by Neil Walton and Pearce respectively with the score at 111-6, as Weymouth looked to bowl the away side out for under

150.

But some late order striking from Rich Poole (35) and J Griffiths (30) helped Broadstone to 184 all out.

After performing well with the bat, Griffiths starred with the ball taking 4-18 from his nine overs including opener Tony Quayle for three.

In similar fashion to the first innings, fellow opener Kieron Womble hit 25 after seeing Neil Walton (0) and Janaway (13) come and go at the other end.

Weymouth were flailing at 48-4 after the departure of Womble and it didn’t get much better for the home side as captain Browne was given out lbw off the bowling of Sam Beer for five.

Now at 55-5 the hosts were in need of a partnership and it duly arrived in the shape of Tom England and Dave Pearce. The pair put on 48 for the seventh wicket as they looked to be turning the tables on Broadstone.

After taking three wickets earlier in the day, Pearce was looking good with the bat hitting three fours in his innings but he holed out to Wildbur off Griffiths’ bowling for 22.

This exposed the tail and Peter Gordon (0) along with Michael Pearce (5) both returned to the pavilion swiftly as England was starting to run out of partners.

James (12no) added some stiff resistance to give the hosts a sniff of victory but once England (43) was caught behind off Rich Poole’s bowling the result seemed inevitable.

The game finished soon after as number 11 Puckett was ran out to give the visitors a 29-run victory.

After the game, Browne acknowledged his batsmen needed to improve if Weymouth were to succeed this season.

He added: “We need to work on that (batting). If we are to win games the top five need to score the majority of our runs.

“I did have the luxury of Tom (England) and Dave (Pearce) down the order, which shows we had a decent amount of depth but we didn’t quite fire.

“On another day it would’ve got us over the line but it just didn’t happen.”

Weymouth are back in action on Saturday as they welcome Ferndown Wayfarers to Redlands as they look to get back to winning ways.