Cuckfield beat Haywards Heath - Heath win in cup - Lindfield back on track

Cuckfield 1st XI vs Haywards Heath 1st XI - report from Cuckfield CC

Cuckfield hosted local rivals Haywards Heath at Cuckfield Park on Saturday. Heath lost the toss and were inserted by Cuckfield on what was a damp morning following persistent overnight rain.

Openers Jonny Phelps and Jethro Menzies quickly took the score to 40 in spite of some good bowling from Nipun Karunanayake and the returning Joe White, before Menzies chipped tamely to extra cover off White for 9.

Heath CC mark 125 years.

Ben Matthew joined Phelps and the scoring rate increased as Phelps used the strong wind to his advantage, moving to 50 in typically easy fashion on what was a good batting pitch. Matthew impressed too, before a horrible misjudgement saw him bowled by a Will Heine full-toss for 28. Greg Wisdom then removed Phelps, well held by Nipun at long off for 54 (including 4 sixes) to leave the visitors 102-3 off 20 overs.

Cuckfield’s spinners quickly began to wrestle back control, with a flurry of wickets in the middle overs leaving Heath 139-5. James Caddick and Chris Blunt tried valiantly to up the scoring rate, but Cuckfield maintained the pressure they had built and Heath struggled to 195-9. Phelps top scored, while Caddick finished on 42 not out. White (3-42) and Josh Hayward (2-17) were the pick of the bowlers.

Sussex League round-up from June 4 matches.

Cuckfield began their chase the happier of the two sides, and quickly began taking the game away from Heath. Nipun and Joe Cambridge were watchful to begin with, before both started to open up as the ball softened.

Having taken the score to 100 in relatively calm fashion, a poor stroke from Nipun gifted Heath a much desired opening, caught by Jemuel Cabey off the bowling of Menzies for 54. Wisdom walked out at 3 and quickly picked up where Nipun left off, rotating the strike back to Cambridge and running hard. With a hundred beckoning, Cambridge unfortunately skied an Ollie Bailey long-hop to deep mid-wicket for 72.

Wisdom followed soon after in near identical fashion, although his miscue found it’s way to mid-on. Any ideas of a stroll to victory for Cuckfield were dashed when Ollie Graham inexplicably flicked Callum Smith’s off spin straight to midwicket. Debutant Will Nolan and skipper Ben Candfield managed to bring the requirement down to 8 off the last 14 balls, as Candfield twice found the boundary.

The impressive Cabey rushed Nolan on the pull to add a further twist, leaving last week’s hero, Will Heine, to attempt to take Cuckfield home again with Candfield. With 2 left to defend off the final over, Cabey delivered an exhibition of death bowling, thrice hitting his yorkers as Heine struggled to lay a bat on it.

The experience of Candfield took over as he dashed his way to the strikers end off the following ball, leaving Heine to sacrifice himself at the bowlers end. With 2 needed off 2 balls, Candfield calmy pushed a full ball from Cabey into the offside, completing the second run amid cheers from the home crowd. Victory moves Cuckfield to the top of Division 2 and they will look to further cement this position next week when they travel away to Chichester.

Cuckfield v Haywards Heath - report from Haywards Heath

Heath looked to bounce back after their first league defeat of the season last week when they visited neighbours Cuckfield.

After overnight rain Cuckfield won the toss and invited Heath to bat. Jethro Menzies was reunited with Jonny Phelps at the top of the order and the pair got off to another good start until Menzies fell to Joe White caught by Joe Cambridge for 9 with the score on 28.

Heath then took some control of the game and must have thought they could build an imposing target with Nick Patterson having to leave the field into his second over with an ankle injury and Josh Hayward taking a nasty blow to the head when shelling a catch off Phelps also taking to the sidelines.

aving played nicely for 28 Ben Matthew he was cleaned bowled by William Heine for 28 (100 for 2.) Phelps having looked to be set for a big score was caught in the deep of the bowling of Greg Wisdom for 54 (102 for 3). Josh Hayward returned to the attack and with Heine started to put the brakes on the Heath run rate and Heath lost the two key wickets of skipper Callum Smith (9) and Ollie Bailey (4) and Heath were 139 for 5.

James Caddick and the cool headed Chris Blunt looked to rebuild the innings and although they both compiled a decent partnership they never got away from Cuckfield and Blunt fell for 21 to Joe White with the score on 178 for 6. Jemuel Cabey and Michael Platt came and went without troubling the scorers and James Caddick after a well-made 42 also fell with Heath finishing on 196 for 9. Pick of the bowlers for Cuckfield were Joe White 3 for 42 and Josh Hayward 2 for 17 in 9 overs.

It felt the score was 30 runs short and Cuckfield opener Joe Cambridge and Nipun Karunanayake batted beautifully selecting their shots sensibly and made easy work of the Heath attack. At the half way point, having just taken drinks, Nipun (54) gave Heath a lifeline giving his wicket away to Jethro Menzies trying to hit him back over his head.

Greg Wisdom joined Cambridge and started to build again and then Cambridge fell to Ollie Bailey for 72 (144 for 2). Ex Heath player Ollie Graham (13) came to the crease and looked in good touch but both he and Wisdom (17) fell to poor shots and Cuckfield were wobbling on 164 for 4. Although run rate was not really an issue Heath started to squeeze and the overs were ticking by.

At 189 pressure was felt by William Nolan who went to Jemuel Cabey for 7. So into the last over Cuckfield needed 2 runs. After 3 dot balls Heine tried to take a scrambled single but the ball was hit back at bowler Cabey who coolly threw down the non striker's end.

With Skipper Ben Canfield on strike and 2 balls left he managed to get team over the line by hitting the penultimate ball for the need 2 runs to complete a 4 wicket victory by a smaller margin than what was necessary. Ollie Bailey took the best figures for Heath of 2 for 30

Heath dropped to 4th in the table and were over taken at the top by Cuckfield. Heath return to league action next week away at St James.

Bognor Regis 1st XI v Cuckfield 1st XI - T20 Cup - report from Cuckfield

Defending T20 Cup champions Cuckfield won a nail-biting third round match at Bognor to reach the quarter finals, where they will take on Eastbourne.

Cuckfield stand-in captain Nipun Karunanayake won the toss and elected to bowl first. Runs came thick and fast for the Bognor opening pair of Ryan Maskell (28) and Nick Ballamy (33) until the change bowling of Greg Wisdom saw Ballamy caught one handed by Josh Downey in the 8th over with the score on 61.

Two wickets in the next over for Dom Sear saw the back of Maskell and then Joe Ashmore (1). Another wicket for Wisdom in the 10th left Bognor floundering at 67 for 4 after 10 overs. Some lusty hitting by Taylor Jaycocks (39*) helped Bogor to 132 for 7 from their 20 overs. Wisdom took 3/26 and Sear 2/20.

The Cuckfield reply was immediately blunted by the opening bowler Nick Stobart removing Joe Cambridge (2), followed by a runout to dismiss Ben John, and then trapping Karunanayake lbw. At 2 for 3 after the first over, the relatively low chase looked more daunting. Ollie Graham (52) and Dom Sear (17) steadied the ship with combination of quick singles and big hitting to create a partnership of 61 to take the visitors to 63 before Sear was stumped off the bowling of Joe Ashmore in the 10th over.

George Galbraith-Gibbons joined Graham and rotated the strike nicely in a partnership of 33 until Graham was caught as he tried to accelerate the run-rate. This brought Dan Turner to the middle who hit 10 runs off his first 4 balls, but another mix-up resulted in Galbraith-Gibbons (12) being run-out . This left Cuckfield needing 26 runs to win from the last 3 overs.

Another wicket for the returning Stobart, but 13 crucial runs left Cuckfield requiring another 13 runs to win off the last. A wicket with the first ball saw Cuckfield hearts flutter, and Bogor resurgent, but Sam Candfield hit a 2 and then a single to get Turner back on strike for the last three balls needing 10 to win. Another 2 followed by 2 fours saw Cuckfield complete a narrow victory as Turner finished on 29 not out. Stobart took 4/22 for Bognor.

Haywards Heath v Chichester - T20 Cup - report from Heath

Heath were back in action the next day to Chi looking to quickly get back to winning ways.

Skipper Smith with only one change from Saturdays game with Josiah Menzies replacing Ollie Bailey won the toss and elected to bat.

Once again Jonny Phelps and Jethro Menzies opened up with Phelps taking on the Chi attack and raced to 30 off 20 balls but fell with the score on 49 to a catch in the deep. James Caddick (3) and skipper Smith (1) saw Heath wobble on 64 for 3. Menzies was joined by Chris Blunt and the pair batter sensibly picking up boundaries regularly and seizing on anything lose. Menzies made a powerful unbeaten 78 off 55 balls (5 fours and 4 sixes) and Blunt also not out on 34 off 32 balls (5 fours). Heath finished on an imposing 161 for 3 off their 20 overs.

In reply Chi after a good first over where 14 runs were conceded never got a foothold in the game and lost regular wickets and were rolled out for 91 off 18.2 overs. The Menzies Brothers returned impressive figures of 10 for 3 for Jethro and 9 for 2 for Josiah. Skipper Smith also bowled well for his 3 for 16.

Heath now have the challenging task of taking on Preston Nomads away in the ¼ finals.

Findon CC 1st XI v Lindfield CC 1st XI - report from Lindfield

Lindfield 1st XI got their season back on track in a low scoring affair against Findon thanks in the main to Steve Lazars' efforts with the ball.

Winning the toss, Lindfield elected to field and soon got into the Findon top order as left-arm seamer, Dom Morgan took 2 for 19. Having lost their first four wickets for 56, the hosts were struggling to get the bowling away on a slow pitch, from which Lazars took great advantage. His 4 for 14 ripped out the Findon middle order ensuring the home side wouldn't pass three figures. Only captain Bradley Bridson made any inroads with a well hit 36, as Simon Shivnarain mopped up the tail with 2 for 6 and Findon finished on just 96.

In reply, Max Kidman (29) and Charlie Weir (25) were making light work of the run chase as they put on 50 for the first wicket, however their departure instigated somewhat of a collapse in the Lindfield ranks as Bridson took 4 for 33 to cause some panic. It took an unbeaten 18 from Jayson Butler to calm the nerves and get the visitors over the line for their third win of the season.

Captain James Aggio-Brewe commented, "It was nice to get back to winning ways following two defeats. We took our catches and bowled good lines on a difficult pitch and ensured we wouldn't have to chase a difficult total. That said, we will have to improve again to take on a tough Wet Chiltington team next week."