Pepperdine delivers a bowling masterclass in Thorpe Arnold victory

James Pepperdine dished out a lesson on how to bowl the Dukes ball as Thorpe Arnold secured an eight-wicket victory when they hosted Enderby in the Leicestershire and Rutland Cricket League Division One on Saturday.

He finished with mind boggling figures of eight wickets for the loss of seven runs from 5.5 overs - five LBWs, three caughts and one bowled.

Mark Starkey took two wickets for the loss of 20 runs.

With the sun beating down, the temperature was well over 30 degrees.

The toss was lost by Richard Randall and the Enderby captain decided to have a bat.

Thorpe opened up with Starkey, whose first ball was dispatched to the boundary. Starkey regained control for the next five balls with dot after dot.

Pepperdine took his first victim of the day, bowling the number two bat with a inswinger and cleaning up middle stump.

The old saying one brings two was proven with the very next ball, this time trapping the batsman LBW.

A mere six balls later Starkey got in on the act with a classy grab from Adam Clark and the visitors were 9-3.

Pepperdine, not wanting to be out done by his opening bowling partner, claimed his third victim of the day after a solid take from Niv Bhojwani.

Then in the very next over, Starkey got another batsman trapped LBW after an in swinger.

After a fantastic maiden over from Starkey, Pepperdine struck again - another swinging delivery getting an edge and a fantastic grab from Clark.

After three more balls, Pepperdine delivered another inswinger and trapped another batsman LBW to make it 12-7.

Enderby started picking up runs before Pepperdine masterfully bowled an unplayable delivery and snared another batsman LBW with the final delivery of his fifth over.

The next Enderby batsman went after picking out Bhojwani in the field for his second catch of the day off the bowling of Pepperdine.

Four balls later, Pepperdine put his last stroke on his masterclass of a performance with another LBW wicket, Enderby were all out for 28.

Thorpe opened up with Clark and Starkey.

Starkey cashed in on some over pitched deliveries and smashed some lovely fours from the first over but was undone by a very good ball with 10 on the board.

Bhojwani then joined Clark before he was undone after a solid grab in the field.

Jaimin Mistry and Clark steadied the ship with some well worked singles and clever batted and got the scores level, before Clark sweet timed a cover drive for four runs with brought Thorpe the well deserved victory.

Thorpe Seconds travelled to Great Glen on Saturday on the hottest day of the year and were always going to bat.

But on looking at the pitch and winning the toss, captain Mark Carnell decided to bowl, much to the disagreement of his teammates.

Tim Hirst and Joe Anderson opened the bowling and again bowled extremely tightly giving the batsmen nothing to hit and keeping the pressure on.

Hirst, after having the opener dropped in the first over, bowled him four overs later.

At the halfway stage Glen were 55-5 with Hirst taking 4-28 from his 10 overs.

With their two spinners Leo Guy and Archie Cropper now bowling in tandem, they continued the good work from earlier.

However, opener Darren John (82) was keeping the Glen innings together until he was caught by George Exton off Archie Cropper's bowling for 82.

Anderson came back on to pickup a wicket as they all were unlucky not to take more.

Andy Sibun was sent in to open the batting for the first time and he gave the reply the perfect start by hitting anything loose to the boundary as Thorpe raced to 40 off six overs.

He was out for an excellent 43 in the eighth over with the score on 55.

Mark Carnell replaced him and he also scored freely but Thorpe lost Exton (5) and Leo Guy (6), but the scoreboard was still ticking over nicely.

Carnell was next out for 40 but Cropper was joined by in-form Anderson with 55 needed.

Thorpe cruised home in the 36th over with Cropper (16 no) and the swashbuckling Anderson (30 no) scoring well.