Burgess Hill bounce back with quick win at Chichester

Chichester won the toss and chose to bat . Captain Dan Strange and George Willett took the new ball for Hill and were accurate and miserly in the opening overs . The pressure built and Willett removed Simon Hasted for 9 caught behind by Luke Vick .

Strange, in the next over then accounted for both Sam Harvey snaffled again by Vick and then Peter Lamb to a fine diving catch by Vick .

At 20-3 and Strange bowling his left-armers with swing and accuracy , Chichester were in trouble , knowing also that they were one man short following an injury in the warm-up. Their plight worsened as Strange trapped George Perry LBW for 2 and then clean bowled Johnny Heaven for a duck .

Charlie Futcher (27) and Rob Carver (12) promised to rally and played some aggressive strokes before both fell LBW to that man Strange .

Peter Billinghay (1-6) and Zain Patel (1-1) accounted for the last two batsmen and Chichester were all out for 76 in the 23rd over . Dan Strange finished with an impressive 6-25 .

If Hill thought it was to be an easy cruise to victory they were soon disillusioned as opener Tom Trowbridge was bowled first ball by Heaven and Phil Marshall (2) off the sixth ball .

It was time for the Simpsons as brothers Jack and Ian calmly and positively put together a 46 run partnership. Sensible singles and well-placed shots put Hill in sight of victory but not before a slight wobble as Carver trapped Ian LBW for 15 and Richard Hancocks had Patel caught off a long-hop which should have been dispatched to the boundary as were the previous 3 balls. Carver then bowled Jack Simpson for a well-made 28 .

There was to be no twist in the tail though as Joe Maskell and Kirk Proto guided Hill to a five-wicket victory.

T20 Cup

Sunday saw Hill take on Crawley Eagles in the T20 cup.

Eagles elected to bowl and opener Tom Trowbridge welcomed the opportunity to get his first runs of the season as Hill got off to a brisk start.

Zain Patel was snared LBW off Imran Mehboob which brought in Jack Simpson who was soon into his stride with Trowbridge busy at the other end.

Mehboob produced a good ball to remove Simpson for 18 but a useful platform was building.

Brother Ian joined Trowbridge as the two put on a 78 run partnership before Trowbridge departed for a run-a-ball 47. Ian continued to slay the Eagles bowlers and when he was caught off Bashar for an excellent 59 in the 17th over Hill looked on course for a competitive 170 total . However, something of a procession then followed and they finished on 158 all out off their 20 overs.

Eagles started their reply calmly and positively with Jibran Khan (33) in good form . This was something of ‘lull before the storm’ though in a controversial fifth over bowled by Dan Strange . With Khan advancing almost halfway down the wicket as Strange started his run up there was a stalemate as Strange stopped and restarted three times as Khan continued to advance before throwing the ball to the keeper who whipped the bails off.

The umpires rightly called a no-ball and Strange was not allowed to bowl another ball in the match

At 48 for no wicket in the eighth over , Eagles were well placed to win the game .

However Jack Simpson (1-16)removed Khan LBW and the Hill bowlers then applied good pressure with slow and medium pace causing Eagles problems . No fewer than four batsmen fell to the safe hands of Ian Simpson at long-on and Eagles were tumbled out of the competition for 117, failing to last the 20 overs.

Hill’s fifth and sixth bowlers, Zain Patel and Joe Maskell both finished with the impressive figures of 4-17, supported by Phil Marshall 1-27 and excellent fielding by all.A fine team performance which takes hill to Premier side Hastings in the next round.

Burgess Hill 2nd XI

Burgess Hill 2nds won comfortably at home to Seaford on Saturday with a six wicket win.

Hill won the toss and elected to bowl and were quickly amongst the wickets, reducing Seaford to 41-5 thanks to three wickets from Hugh Warmisham (3-18) and two from Dan Rapson (2-37). Rapson in particular bowled with great control, consistently asking questions of the batsmen. Ben Brown (39) found some support from Karl Wooten (35) and their runs helped Seaford recover to 106-6 but four wickets from Dan Yates (4-42) who was too good for the Seaford tail, led to a lower order collapse to 121 all out.

Hill’s reply was slow on a wearing wicket and an early loss of Grady Pummell gave Seaford hope. Tom Mackenzie (15) and Warmisham (11) steadied things but both fell in successive overs at 40-3. Tom Penfold was bowled for 13 but Aaron Barnes (46*) initially watchful, exploded as Hill got close and together with Ben Hopkins (19*) got Hill over the line four wickets down inside 31 overs.

Don’t miss out on all the latest breaking news where you live.

Here are four ways you can be sure you’ll be amongst the first to know what’s going on.

1 Make this website your homepage

2 Like our Facebook page at facebook.com/pages/Sport-Sussex

3 Follow us on Twitter @SportSussex

4 Register with us by clicking on ‘sign in’ (top right corner). You can then receive our daily newsletter AND add your point of view to stories that you read here.

And do share with your family and friends - so they don’t miss out!