Southampton Oval (Cleveland County won toss): Cleveland beat Southampton by eight wickets

Cleveland County maintained their perfect record in the 50 Overs Premier Division with victory over Southampton Rangers yesterday.

After opening bowler Jabari Darrell took care of the home team’s opening batters, Dion Stovell and Jamori Beach tore the heart out of the middle and late order, with a combined six wickets.

Beach was the most deadly, snatching three wickets for a mere seven runs in four overs with his slow variations, while Stovell similarly accounted for three wickets, including the prized scalp of Rangers captain Dalin Richardson.

Richardson, again forced to steady Rangers decline after coming in at number four with the score at 18 for two, produced a patient 27 from 50 balls before being undone by his former club-mate, leaving the score at 72 for five.

From there it was only a matter of time before Rangers were dismissed, with the last five wickets falling for just 13 runs.

Cleveland have yet to be seriously tested this season, having won all three matches by comfortable margins, albeit against lower tier clubs, but that scenario will soon change as they enter the final weeks of the competition.

“We started the season positively,” said coach Courtney Trott after Sunday’s triumph. “Our goal is to win every game that we are competing in, so we have started positively in pursuit of that.

“I don’t like to say that we’ve played against the weaker teams, but it hasn’t been the most challenging. The next three games coming up will be more challenging and will ultimately decide how this league goes.

“If you look at the amount of guys batting, we’ve only had six guys who have batted.

“It’s great to win convincingly but there are greater challenges to come.”

This match provided an opportunity for the Harris Bay side to get in some batting practice, which was the initial plan before the toss, but captain Mackih McGowan elected to field first after considering the overcast conditions.

“I said on Thursday that we wanted to bat first today if we won the toss,” said Trott. “But the skipper changed his mind due to the weather conditions. It looked like it was going to rain hence why we fielded first again today.”

Again forced to defend a paltry total, Southampton did themselves few favours in the field, dropping two catches, including one off opener Treadwell Gibbons Jr before he had reached double figures, as well as spilling a skied drive from the bat of Steven Bremar.

Cleveland made short work of reaching the target, with Gibbons batting throughout the innings for his 34, while Bremar notched 36.

Rangers, having lost all four matches played, will now find it difficult to avoid relegation.