Burntwood St Matthews CC 1st XI dropped to fourth in the Staffs Division 3A as they succumbed to a three wicket defeat away to Cannock CC 3rd XI on Saturday.
Burntwood opened the batting, but struggled to find much consistency, as Cannock’s Thomas Bull and Anthony Wood claimed the wickets of the higher order batsmen for relatively low scores.
The visitors then looked to be heading for a complete collapse, as middle order batsmen Neil Gould and Neil Edmonds were both clean-bowled for 12 and a duck respectively.
This succession of low scoring did not seem to damper the confidence of the Burntwood lower order however, as George Farmer (32) and Matthew Neal (42) restored much-needed some runs to their team’s.
The visitors finished on 200 runs after their 50 overs, with both tail end batsmen ending the innings not out, with Anthony Wood (4-46) and Jamie Fleet (2-22) the pick of the Cannock bowling.
Cannock started their batting innings with confidence, opener Nick Bandurak notching an impressive 84, a total which included 14 fours, and six sixes.
Daniel Wood was another star of the Cannock batsmen, finishing the match on 33 runs not out.
George Haywood (3-64) and Matthew Neal (2-45) were the stand-out bowlers for Burntwood, but this was not quite enough as Cannock sealed the victory with 8 overs to spare.
This result further cements Cannock’s place at the top of the Staffs Division 3A, while Burntwood slip to fourth place with three matches still to play.
