1st Suffer Village Cup Defeat To Excellent Sarisbury

Two Sams impress in National Village Cup.

Sarisbury Athletic dashed Liphook & Ripsley’s attempt to get to the Cricketer Village Cup Final at Lord’s for the second successive year with a well deserved 86 run win at Allotment Road. Sarisbury will now represent Hampshire in the national competition.

Skipper Chaz Janczur relied on spin, having put Sarisbury in to bat. To begin with it looked to be a telling decision, as veteran slow left armer Dave Elliott 8-2-13-3, opening the attack, claimed three early wkts. Elliott dismissed 3 of the home side’s top 4 bowling skipper Ricky Rawlings. At 43-3, after 12 overs, Liphook’s hopes were high.

However, the game was largely decided by a left hand opener Sam Floyd who plugged away with 85 invaluable runs which included 10 fours. Chris Sanders 19 and Michael Bond 13 supported with some quick running so that when Harry Munt caught Hill at long off, the total had moved on to a more comfortable 168. After 40 overs, Sarisbury closed on 171-9.

Liphook’s batting failed to come up to scratch with only Rob Nicklin showing promise with 25: an opening partnership of 34 with Chris Martin 12. Thereafter Liphook’s batsmen struggled to get into double figures as Jason Allmark 3-11 and spinner Sam Hill, with a devastating 5-10, ripped through the visitor’s innings, dismissed for a greatly disappointing 85 after only 27.5 overs.