Blighted by poor display of batting
Self-inflicated pain in league season blow
Meigle travelled to Arbroath on Saturday hoping to repeat their early season league win against the Lichties.
Home skipper Petrie won the toss and unsurprisingly opted to bat first on a fine-looking deck and a rapid, if vast, outfield.
Meigle contained Arbroath well early on and made a breakthrough in the fifth over when Plomer got a feather on one behind off the bowling of Majid Rashid.
It was to be a long time until the Meigle fielders would meet again to celebrate the fall of a wicket.
McLean and Parker showed their top-level experience to get themselves in on a good wicket and never really gave Meigle a sniff of a chance until the final overs.
They manoeuvred the field well and ran excellently throughout their 187-run partnership.
As ever, the Meigle bowling and fielding held up at this level – with good discipline shown by all the bowlers used and a lot of grass covered by the fielders.
Both Arbroath batsmen fell agonisingly short of securing centuries, with McLean making 95 and Parker 97.
Some late impetus was added by Cameron as Arbroath ended on an impressive 260-5.
To chase this down the Meigle top order would have to fire as it had done the previous Sunday in the win over Stoneywood Dyce.
Majid Raheed set off well with three well-struck boundaries before carelessly hitting one to long-on to be well caught by Cameron.
After that the wheels completely came off as wickets fell at an alarming rate.
The batsmen fell to mainly selfinflicted dismissals, although young Daniel Salmond was hitting his straps and Craig Ramsey was on the money as usual.
With no batsman making more than 16 the Meigle innings ended on a paltry 87.
The visitors were left to reflect on another dismal batting display that has blighted their league season in the glorious evening sunshine.