By Harry Watts

ON an overcast Saturday, Thornbury hosted Burbage and Easton Royal in the West of England Premier League Prem 2 Glos/Wilts division hoping to bounce back after last week’s disappointing display against Rockhampton.

The visitors won the toss and elected to field first.

A new Thornbury opening partnership of Dan Davis and Tom Bradley were hoping to get their side off to a positive start.

But the experiment only lasted five overs, before Davis was out for one. This brought Josh Slade to the crease, whose innings was running smoothly, but he couldn’t find a partner to stay with him.

Bradley was bowled for seven, a couple of overs later and captain Luke Davis was caught for one, and Danny Slade followed, bowled for four, which left Thornbury on 40-4.

However, Marcus Wormwell, at six, put on a 40-run partnership with Slade, which put Thornbury back in contention.

Wormwell fell lbw for ten and Slade departed minutes later for 47, which left it to the tail to salvage the innings.

James Tunnicliffe managed 14 before he was bowled, Vishal Mamgai could only get to five before he was also bowled and debutant Jordan Hicks departed for seven.

This left Thornbury on 126-9 with eight overs still to play, but Jack Gillett (13no) and Luke Franklin (17no) put on a partnership of 32 which got Thornbury up to a defendable, yet still sub-par, score of 157-9.

Thornbury came out to bowl knowing that only a top-performance in the field would be enough.

Burbage raced to 27-0 after five overs, before the first wicket fell courtesy of Bradley.

Wickets fell at regular intervals, meaning that for the next eight wickets, the highest partnership the visitors could manage was 19, restricting them to 94-9.

Bradley picked up two more wickets, fellow opening bowler Luke Franklin claimed two victims, with Luke Davis (pictured insert) bowling accurately and finishing with impressive figures of 10-5-23-3, including the wicket of star batsman Deepak Joon (22).

Tunnicliffe struck with a run out.

This meant that Burbage still needed 64 runs yet, over by over, the bowlers couldn’t dismiss tailenders Wallbridge and Lavis.

And the numbers ten and 11stayed composed until, in the 44th over, the pair steered the away side to victory, finishing on 158-9 with six overs remaining, with their partnership worth an unbeaten 64 runs.

The defeat was hard to take for Thornbury given the position they were in, but they’ll want to bounce back away at Biddestone.