Crickhowell’s winning streak came to an abrupt end on Saturday as they were well beaten by a very strong looking Luctonians side.

Nick Francis again won the toss and on a fast scoring ground, which is notoriously difficult to defend, he thought that bowling first would be his side’s best tactic.

At the toss, however, he also thought he had six bowlers at his disposal, only to discover when returning to the changing room, that Jawahir, who ripped through Luctonians on his last visit to this ground, had developed a back strain.

Within three overs of the game too, he also lost Cornock who pulled a groin whilst fielding in the deep. This was a ‘triple whammy’ as this meant that Cornock’s bowling and athletic fielding were lost, and his powerful batting in the middle order would also be missed, as he was only able to hobble around and bat at 11.

On top of that, the Bowker brothers, having shown good form with the ball this season both failed to find any rhythm and were severely punished early on by Platford senior, Light and Platford junior.

Francis was forced to bring himself on and showed all his guile and expertise in taking four wickets. In truth though, he should have had several more as he continually beat the bat, but had strong LBW shouts turned down.

The most critical was that of James Platford who went on to score an unbeaten century. Platford (109 not out) and Burke (56 not out) piled on the runs at the end as Luctonians posted a challenging total of 269 in their 45 overs.

Phill Bowker bowled his 12 overs for a creditable 33 runs, but with only Francis taking wickets, Crickhowell were unable to stem the run fest.

At tea the Crickhowell side were demoralized, and the talk, inevitably, was about ‘those LBW shouts’ that were turned down. Francis then had insult added to injury when he discovered that the umpire and scorers had miscounted his overs and he hadn’t bowled his full quota that the paying regulations allowed.

Facing a daunting run chase, none of the Crickhowell batsmen showed any real motivation or application to at least get up to a reasonable score and grab some batting points, even if the win seemed to be out of the question.

Jawahir, who won the game with the bat the previous week, went early and of course the big hitting Cornock was unable to bat in his usual top order slot.

Only three managed double figures, Watts (11) J. Bowker (13) and Jones (13), as Crickhowell were humiliated in the face of some very good bowling and superb fielding from a well-motivated Luctonians side.

Griffiths took four for 33 and Dilshan two for 44 and first change bowler Bengry, bowling with some pace and venom, took four for 12 in less than six overs to send Crickhowell home with their tails between their legs, bowled out for a paltry 96 in less than 30 overs.

As the dust settled on a woeful display, and a ‘bad day at the office’, Crickhowell at least realised that this was a very good looking Luctonians side who had out played them in all departments and certainly deserved to win.

Luctonians now move to the top of the table and can be considered as firm favourites to win the league, but Crickhowell couldn’t help wondering what might have been, if those LBW shouts, and Platford’s in particular before he’d even made double figures, had been given!

Crickhowell now need to put this heavy defeat behind them and pick themselves up for the visit of Marden Cannon Frome next week and with Lilley and Price returning at least Crickhowell can select from a full strength squad.