SEPL PREMIER 1.

Havant (278-6) beat Hursley Park (197-8).

Havant's openers got off to a flying start against Hursley Park.

Put in by Jimmy Taylor, they scored well before Billy Taylor trapped Steve Dean in front and Farhan Bashir bowled Lawrie Prittipaul to remove Havant's early advantage.

A stand of 79 between Ben Walker (49) and Stuart Ransley (94) tilted the balance back to the visitors, however.

With Ransley anchoring the innings, the batting attacked from the other end with Will Prozesky (31) and Brendan Mills prominent.

When Taylor bowled Ransley, it was left to Richard Hindley and Richard Pineo to raise the final total to 278, Taylor finishing with figures of 3-54.

Billy Taylor, starting the reply with Phil Hughes, scored freely until he was superbly caught by Ransley for 25. Paul Edwards joined Hughes to set the platform and added 52 before Edwards holed out for 22.

Hughes reached a half century but seemed to lose concentration and fell for exactly 50.

Wickets started to fall but Paul Davies (23) and, latterly, Farhan Bashir, with six boundaries in his nine-ball 24, saw Hursley fall short on 197-8.

Despite a much improved bowling and fielding display, the Hursley Park II batting failed once again and they slumped to a 56-run defeat against United Services.

Tom Burns and Dom Ducellier bowled miserly spells, conceding only 37 runs from their 20 overs as the Services batting found the going hard on their way to 164-9.

Sameer Thacker and Jerry Edmunds took two wickets apiece.

Bryan Coughtrie apart, the Hursley batting failed and, without his 39, the total would have been more embarrassing than the 108 actually achieved.

Hursley's 3rd XI moved up to third place in Regional Division 1 North with a 21-run win in a high-scoring match at Old Alresford.

Choosing to bat, Hursley's batsmen enjoyed the conditions with Steve Cockram (70), Dave Mansbridge (50), Tom Tennant (46no), Steve Jones (41) and Tim Nash (23no) all among the runs in a total of 268 for 4.

Alresford kept up the chase but fell narrowly short with Cockram, Nash and Anton George each claiming two wickets as they were dismissed for 247.

Hursley's fourth XI, meanwhile, were involved in a low scoring success against Ropley II on a slow paced wicket at the Quarters.

The Hursley attack again turned up trumps after the visitors had been asked to bat first. They found scoring difficult against seamers Dave Worthy (12-3-25-2) and Tom Winter (12-2-31-2) before spinners Ali Mortaza (8-1-25-3) and Chris Westbrook (8-3-10-1) polished them off for 107.

But Hursley also found runs hard to come by and slumped to 80 for 7 before the tailenders saw them home with two wickets in hand.

The win puts them back in the promotion hunt in Division 3 North East.