SHERBORNE 210-2 (20pts) beat MARTINSTOWN 205 (5pts) by eight wickets

MARTINSTOWN were dealt a heavy eight-wicket defeat as their poor Dorset Premier League season continued at Sherborne.

Charlie Durant’s men are now just 29 points ahead of relegation-threatened Puddletown with four games remaining.

Town have failed to live up to the promise of last season’s superb third-placed finish, in which they were in the title hunt until the final few games.

They have now lost five consecutive games and struggled to find a cutting edge with the ball against Sherborne.

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Martinstown won the toss and elected to bat, with Ed Nichols providing the anchor role.

Despite Sean Williams (19) being castled by Tim Durston (3-38), Nichols and Will Maltby (25) guided the visitors to 101-1 before a wobble saw them reduced to 120-4.

Maltby, Ry Gerety (1) and Nichols (50) all went, the latter for a well-constructed half-century off 104 balls.

Tom Pope (33), Finlay Williams (40) and Ryan Blair (12) scored typically quickly in response but Emlyn Kuhn (5-40) returned to halt their progress and sweep up the lower order as Town fell to 205 all out.

With conditions still favourable for batting, Sherborne capitalised with an unbroken century stand for the opening wicket.

Mark Roca had surpassed fifty by the time Ryan Monk (45) was bowled five runs shy of his own milestone, Durant (1-43) the man to strike.

Roca looked set to fly to his century until Archie Gardner (1-40) rustled his timbers, ending an innings comprising of 15 fours.

Sherborne were now 184-2 and Marc Lock (39no) and Roger Parfitt (11no) were able to ease the hosts home without further alarm to complete a maximum-point win.

Speaking to Echosport, Durant said: “In all honesty, I can’t fault any of the lads.

“We didn’t quite bat the 50 (overs) but there wasn’t anyone who gave their wicket away. There wasn’t any bad shots.

“They bowled really well, it’s their home ground and restricted us to 205 which I thought was a pretty solid total but it didn’t happen that way and they knocked it off pretty easily.

“I think we just got outplayed. We struggled. Their opener up top got a lot of runs and we never looked in the game, we never looked like taking a wicket.

“All of our bowlers bowled good areas, there was just nothing really in the pitch to assist.

“Everyone bowled a seven-out-of-ten spell and they batted really well, so there’s not a lot you can do – it’s one of those days.”

Martinstown Seconds fell victim to Sherborne Seconds in County Division Three, losing by seven wickets at Lower Ashton Farm.