National Village Cup Fifth Round

Hambledon (235-5) beat Rockhampton (233-8) by five wickets

ROCKHAMPTON'S hopes of returning to Lord's this season were ended by Hambledon on Sunday.

In front of a substantial crowd and aiming to get the last 16 of the National Village Cup, last year's beaten finalists won the toss and elected to bat first. Hambledon bowled well and managed to keep Matt Tyler fairly quiet, but they had no answer to his brother Will at the other end as he found the boundary with regularity and the pair brought up the 50 partnership in the 11th over.

Will Tyler then decided to really crack on with things and Rockhampton progressed to 85-0 off 15 and Will onto a superb half-century before falling for 60, caught in the deep in the 17th over.

The period that followed proved to be a very decisive one as the visitors bowled a spell of 12 overs for just 31 runs with Rockhampton moving into the 28th over of their innings with just 116 on the board.

Needing to move things along, a flurry of wickets followed with Matt Tyler (48) eventually falling just shy of a well deserved 50.

Rob Belbin was faultless and put together a superb 25 off 15 balls, including one over the pavilion.

Several batsmen came and went, selflessly around the in-form Guy Brothwood (45) to close Rockhampton's innings on a slightly below-par 233-8.

In response, the visitors got off to a slow and understandably nervy start with Brothwood removing one of the openers thanks to an excellent catch from Belbin to leave the score on 16-1 from six overs.

However, the other opener, Joe Collings-Wells looked at ease from ball one and saw off the new ball without too much alarm.

Collings-Wells continued on his merry way as a couple of wickets fell around him and for as long as he was at the crease Rockhampton had little chance of victory.

The bowlers gave it their all but without much reward with Brothwood (2-32) and Will Cartlidge (1-44) the stand-out performers.

Collings-Wells continued to look to score off every ball he faced and brought up a chanceless and probably the best hundred seen at The Boundary Field for many a year to finish on 109 not out and see the visitors home with two overs to spare.