CRICKET: Littlehampton look destined for the drop

LITTLEHAMPTON Cricket Club's slim hopes of avoiding relegation into Sussex League Division 3 West appear over after their 10th defeat in 12 matches on Saturday.
By The Newsroom
Published 29th Jul 2009, 17:14 BST
Updated 8th Jun 2018, 01:05 BST

With six games left, they are now 78 points adrift of safety at the bottom of Division 2, and meet two of the top three, Chichester and Stirlands, in their next two matches.

On Saturday's loss at Pulborough, captain Gareth Challen said: "Obviously, we are basically down but, until it's mathematically certain, you never know.

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"We've got the same amount of bonus points as a lot of the sides, and Worthing have only won three games so, if we can get a couple of wins, it would be good to not finish bottom.

"We also have to play Worthing twice so if we can pick up a couple of wins before we play them, we might have a chance of finishing above them."

Littlehampton posted 202 at Pulborough, just the third time they have got past 200 this season, but still went down by five wickets despite four wickets for Benn Challen.

Benn Challen had earlier top-scored with 42 from 81 deliveries on a difficult batting track.

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Chris Heberlein added an unbeaten 36 and put on 27 for the last wicket with Chris Hanks to boost his side's total.

But an opening stand of 113 between Matt Crump (41) and Jonathan Haynes (69) laid the foundations for Pulborough's winning run chase.

Gareth Challen said: "If we'd taken an early wicket, things could have been different. But our confidence isn't that high and it was only when we got three or four wickets that we started to believe.

"Our batting and bowling was better than last week but we know we can still improve on both.

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"We had some good performances, though '“ Benn, with the bat and ball, Chris Heberlein batted well, and Ryan Budd bowled well again."

Littlehampton, who are still winless, host leaders Chichester on Saturday. Chichester include Chris Kirkham, who left Littlehampton at the end of last season, and he hit 112 in Chichester's nine-wicket win over Roffey on Saturday.

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Related topics:CricketChichesterDivision 2