AFTER last week s setback, Buntingford were back in the winners enclosure after an emphatic win in their away fixture against Newport on Saturday. Buntingford skipper Barry Walker chose to bat and his team were soon in trouble, losing the early wickets

AFTER last week's setback, Buntingford were back in the winners' enclosure after an emphatic win in their away fixture against Newport on Saturday.

Buntingford skipper Barry Walker chose to bat and his team were soon in trouble, losing the early wickets of John Clements and Chambers.

Dixon was joined by Martin Coote in the middle and a hard hit 32 from Dixon gave the innings some impetus.

Scoring runs on a poor wicket was difficult, but a patient innings of 93 from Coote, helped by Scott Nash (31), enabled Buntingford to post a total of 192 all out with one ball remaining from their 45 overs.

The Newport reply got off to a great start, with 40 runs coming from the first six overs. Chris Chambers bowled through his 10 overs, taking 2-24.

Barry Walker showed the value of a spin bowler on a turning wicket.

The Newport batsmen were never able to come to terms with the amount of turn Walker extracted and he finished with figures of 3-19 from his 10 overs.

Clements also took advantage of the wicket with a great spell of slow left arm orthodox spin bowling, his 10 overs giving him figures of 2-40.

Dan Duff was again consistent taking 1-37 from eight overs and the Newport tail was finished off by Steven Paola with the final two wickets in his first over.

Buntingford II made it a win double for the club with an easy home win against Thorley II.

Winning the toss, skipper Neil Atkins chose to bat and they reached 34 before they lost Smith for 14.

Mike Townsend was then joined by Kev Poulton and together they put on a stand of 57 before Poulton was unluckily run out for 20.

Townsend followed soon after for a fine 53, leaving Buntingford on 92-3. Stuart Lawrence scored 22 before he was bowled by Carter.

After his departure, some poor and ill-judged shots by the Buntingford batsmen saw them collapse to 152-9.

Neil Atkins came to the wicket with things looking pretty bleak. However, Atkins played a captain's innings and being well backed up by Rubul, they shared a great last wicket stand of 60.

Both players hit the ball hard to all parts of the boundary; Atkins finished unbeaten on 30 and Rubul was the last man out, caught behind off the bowling of Sydes for a fine 32 as Buntingford finished on 212.

In reply, Thorley were always struggling. With Karl White bowling tightly from the top end, Clive Glasscock had all the batsmen in trouble bowling up the hill.

His spell of 10 overs destroyed the top order and he returned figures of 4-19. Aitken was the only Thorley batsman to keep his wicket intact, but he only managed to score at a very slow rate.

Buntingford continued to bowl tightly, with Atkins producing figures of 10-1-24-0 and Rubul 8-1-21-2.

Thorley had reached 89-9 when Dellow came to the wicket with his team requiring an impossible 124 runs from just six overs.

He put the rest of his team to shame with an amazing display of hard hitting. In those six overs he hit 51 runs to all parts of the field, before he was finally out, caught on the boundary by White off the last ball of the game.

Aitken remained unbeaten with 39 and Thorley finished on 145 all out, giving Buntingford victory by 67 runs.

On Sunday, Buntinfgord CC chairman George Wurr fielded a team in the annual game against the first team.

Although the 40-over game was a low scoring affair, it nevertheless proved to have a tense finish.

Batting first, the chairman's team found keeping the scoreboard ticking over quite difficult. With the Buntingford bowlers giving nothing away, the batsman were soon struggling for runs. Dan Duff (6-1-10-0 ) and captain Chris Cambers (6-3-10-2) both bowled well.

The first wicket fell at 28 and after that the batsmen were out at fairly regular intervals. Late on in the game, and with the chairman's XI struggling at 106-8, a new young Buntingford star emerged.

Nine-year-old Josh Poulton was brought on to bowl. He not only pitched the ball up to the batsmen on the full length adult pitch, but he removed the last two batsmen, clean bowling Bob Hammond and having Neil Atkins caught by another young player, Chris Jordan.

Man-of-the-match Poulton finished with figures of 2-3 off 14 balls as the chairman's team were dismissed for 114, Wurr top scoring with 22.

In reply, the Buntingford openers made steady progress despite losing Townsend early on for six and they progressed to 58-1 from 20 overs without serious problems.

When Neil Dookheran was out for a well constructed top score of 25, Karl White came to the crease only to be bowled first ball.

Scott Nash came to the wicket, saw off the hat-trick ball and started hitting the ball hard.

Nash started to move the score along quickly and, with opener Stuart Calder still proving solid at the other end, it looked like Buntingford had the game safely in their pocket.

When Calder was out for 18, Chris Chambers came to join Nash and together they continued to score the runs to put their side within sight of the finishing line.

Obviously feeling confident about winning, they then both played ludicrous shots and got themselves out, leaving the game finely balanced. at 97-6.

Robbie Dexter (nine not out) was proving difficult to remove, but with two of his fellow batsmen falling for ducks, the score reached 104-8.

Colt Chris Jordan provided some resistance before he was out for one with the score on 109-9.

Last man Dan Duff came to the wicket, hoping to repeat his performance of last week when he hit the winning runs. This looked likely when he smashed his fourth ball for four to take the score to 113.

But he was not to be the hero this time, as a couple off ball later he edged a ball from Atkins to slip where Tim Knight took a fine catch to give victory to the chairman's team by just one run.