This was another scintillating win for Wellington in the Somerset Division of the West of England Premier League last weekend when they triumphed on the road at Bath with a 44-run win over Temple Cloud, who relocated to Farmborough after having had to leave their spiritual Bristol home a couple of years ago, writes David Derrick.
With Ilminster and Yeovil also winning in this round of matches, the Red and Blacks are 17 points behind Yeovil and 24 behind Ilminster.
So, with seven matches remaining in the 2026 season, it looks like a three-way battle for the title is going to be the 'end games'.
The key fixtures for this trio are Wellington v Yeovil on Saturday, August 1, and Ilminster v Yeovil on Saturday, August 15.
Wellington has an unbeaten record against the other two sides so far this summer, so that may count for something in the long run.
As for this match, one that was played in searing heat once more, it went the full 100 overs, all bar five balls, and was easily the last game of the day in the division to end time-wise.
Jacob Hurry had little hesitation in choosing to bat first, and this was indeed the case.
From 16-2 with a wicket each to Temple opening pair Croker and Fox, the door was firmly slammed shut by Luke Desave and Sam Whitefield, who added 149 for the fourth wicket from a position of 80-3 of which Lakshan Edirisinghe had made a composed 30 (four fours, 42 balls).
Desave made his maiden league ton (his second all told for Wellington) as he crafted 103 in 134 balls with 16 fours as his transition from the pure bowler of pace who was a more than capable batter from 'back in the day' is now that of opening batter in both forms of the game.
Whitefield made his fourth WEPL Somerset Division half-century in a row with a pulsating 79 in 69 balls with fourteen fours and a six as the Temple attack wilted.
229-3 became a final 272-9 for Wellington as a late punch to the score came about from James Hibbert (21 in 15 balls with three fours) and Jacob Hurry with 13 not out.
All of the Temple attack took an element of tap from the Wellington batters as their catching let them down at times too; no bigger costly example of this came when Desave was dropped in the slips on four.
Mortimer, with his off-spin, took 4-44 in eight overs, which were exemplary in the round.
Croker and Ward started at a good pace for Temple with the bat, but when Ward was run out going for a run that simply wasn't there their impetus was stifled.
Eventually, Croker, with 60 made in 61 balls - including nine fours and three sixes, was trapped LBW by Arron Campbell to leave Temple at 92-3.
Fifth-wicket pair Hales and Thompson added seventy carefully curated runs for the home side, but just took too long to make them and so ate up valuable overs when the correct thing to do was to try and up the pace and not 'die wondering' as the Temple innings drifted from 100-4 to 170-5 when Thompson was out for 35.
From the score of 170, the home side were all out for 228 in 49.1 overs as the wicket-taking duties were shared out.
A caught-and-bowled chance was accepted by Stian Smith to remove Hales for 36, but he, too, had laboured for too long in compiling this knock.
Luke Desave topped his great day by taking 2-31 in six overs, and it was left to Toby Stirzaker (2-45 in nine) to end things off to give Wellington another 20-point haul to Temple's nine.
Wellington now face the bottom two sides in Taunton at home and North Perrott on the road in the next two weeks ahead of the big visit from Yeovil at the start of August.
Swindon come calling in the final of the WEPL Four Regions T20 Cup for Tier Three sides on Sunday, July 19, and with a local derby the day before, together with 2026's Thank You Day, it's going to be a busy one at the Lloyd and Whyte ground this weekend.
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