Prestbury miss out on valuable win

PRESTBURY fell to an agonising defeat against Kingsley.

Prestbury won the toss and batted, Stu Costello and Aqeel Ahmed opened the batting but Aqeel went for 14.

Costello dug in and made a solid 11, Tim Braender came to the wicket and showed how his batting has improved this season and faced 47 balls for his 20.

Chris Hall joined him and they put on 38 runs with Hall getting a quick 18, so when Braender was out Prestbury were 80 for 3.

Tom Livesley played a steady innings of 19 off 24 balls but when he was out the innings fell apart.

Cameron Kirkland was out first ball, Abdullah Waseem 9, Max Cowley Jones 1, Sam Gilding 1, Kevin Murray 0, leaving captain Ben Oakes 6 not out and a total of 109 all out.

It was not going to be easy to defend. Stoddart and Mullins opened the Kingsley batting and the first wicket didn’t fall until the score was 79.

Stoddart was out for 51, caught Waseem off the bowling of Murray.

Oakes came in to the attack to bowl and got a wicket with his first ball caught by wicket keeper Ahmed.

Mullins made 27, Hartley was bowled by Murray but with only five runs to win it was too late and Kingsley reached their target without further losses.

Prestbury have one game to play and are 21 points ahead of Cheadle Ladybridge so need five points to be sure of safety.