ON another weekend badly affected by the weather, Leigh CC made up for the disappointment of having their match at Lytham abandoned by triumphing over the elements to win at South West Manchester and book a place in the semi-finals of the Thwaites Lancashire Knockout Trophy.
Leigh, who were without opening batsman Steve Mullaney who was on duty with the England Under 17s team, were put into bat by league leaders Lytham and initially found runs hard to come by against accurate bowling by Sharp and Rigby.
Andy Batterley (8) and Tim Rees (19) were both adjudged lbw as the score advanced to 59 but Dave Dove resisted well for over two hours before being caught out in the 34th over having scored 40.
With Neil Williams and Liam Zammit both departing cheaply, Leigh were still looking to step up the scoring rate at 139 for 5 after 46 overs.
Gareth Cross had meanwhile been carefully playing himself in and he gradually took control with some sweetly struck boundaries. He became completely dominant and when the league's leading opening bowler Marcus Sharp was reintroduced into the attack he was treated with complete disdain by the young Leigh wicketkeeper who went on to equal his highest score for Leigh in league games before he was dismissed for 90 off 114 balls including ten fours and one six.
Unusually, Leigh were forced to bat on after the tea interval before declaring at 203 for 8 off 60 overs with Ronnie Davis chipping in with a useful 18. For Lytham, Sharp's first spell of 10 overs brought him 1 for 16 but he had to settle for 1 for 44 after some rough treatment from Cross. Home skipper Warren McSkimming took 3 for 42.
Lytham were soon in trouble and were 39 for 3 and looking really shaky, with Ronnie Davis (1 for 21) being extremely unlucky not to have taken more wickets. Roberts (41 not out) and Wisniewski (28 not out) then batted well and had taken the score to 99 with 18.2 overs remaining when the rain came down with the game nicely poised for an exciting finish.
Because of the rain, the following day's match at South West Manchester did not commence until 5.35 with the captains having agreed to play a game of 20 overs per side.
Leigh were asked to bat first and were given a tremendous start by Batterley (24) and Davis (25) who scored 48 in the first 6 overs.The good work was carried on by Zammit (35 off 26 balls) and Rees who was caught out off the last ball of the innings for 22, Leigh having totalled 128 for 7.
In reply, Pillay (38) and Lennon (17) took the home side to 66 for 2 in the eleventh over but none of the other batsmen reached double figures as they were dismissed for 102, a total that included a sizeable helping of 29 extras.
Leigh's best bowlers were Davis (2 for 16), Wilson (2 for 20) and the ever dependable Chris Melia with 1 for 16 and they were backed up by some excellent fielding.
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