Goresbrook top Rankins, but lose top ranking

Goresbrook skipper Kurt Whisker lost the toss & was asked to bowl on a warm and sticky day at May & Bakers Sports Ground.

Unleashing the devastating pace of Israel Ochwo & fast medium of Shaun Ross this decision bore fruit when young Ross clean bowled Rankins opening bat Sotherby.

This was to be the only success for the pacey bowling duo, however as despite a fine spell from Ochwo, the visitors stood firm. Captain Whisker then took the pace down a notch, by introducing the bustling military medium of Kane Messenger and the clubs premier spinner Shane Barwick to the attack.

Messenger is in fine form at the moment and 9 overs of typically all out effort resulted in the scalps of opener Lees (33) and Warner (18) before fatigue set in and he was replaced with fizzy spin of Toby Maund.

Maund is an inspiration to any club cricketer as only last season he was overweight & out of form and consequently dropped to the 2nd team, but with hard work & the right training programme (see TJ Fitness for details) he is back in the 1st team and he ripped the heart out of the Rankins middle order finishing with figures of 3 for 23, the off-spinners only issue being a tendency to bowl wides.

With wickets tumbling, Whisker smelled blood and brought back his paceman Ochwo and the Ugandan born quick had too much for the Rankins tail, cleaning up to finish with figures of 3 for 25 from an excellent days work.

In reply openers Whisker & Irving continued their good form adding 98 for the opening wicket before Irving fell for 24.

This left Whisker (81 no) and Michael Rooke (25 no) to knock off the winning runs in just 25 overs. Whisker continuing his prolific form this season hitting fourteen 4s and one 6 in his unbeaten 81.

The home skipper said after the game “I was really pleased with the bowlers this week, at times this season we've been very reliant on Shane Barwick and although he had an off-day today, Izzy, Kane and Toby all stepped up."