AN unbeaten and top of the table Llantwit Major fell foul of a winning Llanarth performance on the weekend that saw the home-side jump to third place in the league.

Electing to bat on a hard bouncy pitch, Llanarth enjoyed their usual steady start as Glenn (35) and Baxter (32) put on 68 for the first wicket.

Unfortunately, following their dismissals, the next two wickets fell fairly cheaply with the score

at 128-4 in the 30th over.

However the combination of Gareth Powell (78) and Heath (36) took the score to 204 by the 40th over, with balls flying to or over the boundary.

Despite numerous personnel changes, Llantwit could not halt the onslaught, and to make matters worse, the visitors conceded 29 wides through some wayward bowling.

With some small contributions from the remaining batsmen, Llanarth eventually finished on 245-7, with Llantwit's best bowler taking 3-54.

Bolstered by a very useful score, Llanarth's spirits were lifted even further as Llantwit lost their first two batsmen with only 20 on the board, including prolific scorer Griffiths going for a duck.

A lively wicket partnership developed between Withers (57) and Ward (56) as they put on 91 to take the score to 111.

However, following their dismissals, the remaining batsmen were unable to contribute as Llantwit lost six wickets for 30 runs.

They were unable to score against Chris Powell who conceeded 23 runs from nine overs, and whilst Powell was frustrating the batsmen, Baxter (4-10) and Hinton (3-27) got amongst the wickets to leave Llanarth 160 all out.

LLANARTH'S second team's three match winning streak came to a disappointing but heroic end on Saturday when they went down in an ultimately thrilling encounter with Llantwit Major. Being without several of his more experienced bowlers Llanarth skipper Keith Spencer made the slightly controversial decision to field first, figuring that when the chips were down at the end of the game that the batters might handle the pressure better.

In the event he need not have worried about the bowling, as despite Llantwit getting off to a good start with 45 in the first eight overs they were soon pulled back by some excellent bowling from two of the youngest players.

Gruffydd Parry took a wicket in each of his first two overs in a tight spell of seven overs, conceding only 17 runs and was followed up by Dafydd Halls on his league debut who bowled very straight and was rewarded with dream figures of three for 14 off six overs.

Despite a late flurry of runs Llantwit were restricted to a very gettable 187-6 and Llanarth took tea in reasonably confident mood.

The now established opening pair of Spencer and Peter Francis got off to their customary solid start and at 42 for no wicket Llanarth were big favourites, however all that changed in the space of six balls.

Francis was out dislodging his own bails whilst desperately trying to prevent the ball trickling back on to the stumps, Dunn was bowled for a duck and Spencer caught at gully driving at a wide one.

42-0 became 42-3 and soon 60-6 as the middle order collapsed. So much for the batters handling the pressure!

The carnage was being watched from the other end by Dave Griffiths who had come in at five on the strength of some good knocks this season and now found himself stranded with the tail with 26 overs to go.

A patient partnership with Rhys Willbourn yielded 42 runs but a further clatter of wickets saw last man Piers Bisson stroll to the wicket to join Griffiths who knew it was now all down to him.

85 needed in 15 overs with the last pair at the wicket, the big favourites were now big dogs and even Paddy Power had closed the books on this one.

Although not a great run scorer Bisson is however a top quality blocker allowing Griffiths to consider batting out the overs and accumulating what runs and bonus points he could.

Mixing solid defence with some good shots to the bad ball the score gradually mounted along with the Llantwit fielders frustration.

With three overs left the score had just passed 150 leaving 35 to get. At this point Griffiths exploded into action hitting two big sixes and taking 20 runs from the over.

15 off two however became 15 off one as Bisson was unable to find the single necessary to give Griffiths the strike, and in an effort to repeat his heroics of the previous over, Griffiths finally perished to a catch on the boundary for a glorious 91.

A match that could have been won was lost but all present had witnessed one of the innings of the season even if ultimately it was in vain.