After a short weather and bye week break the Petersfield Ladies 1st XI were back in action away at Cove on Sunday. Stand in skipper, Lily George, called incorrectly at the toss and was asked to bat first on a decent track with a large boundary.

It was a case of getting in and getting out for Petersfield who lost wickets as soon as they started to look comfortable. Zoe Stride scored a quick fire 13 including two consecutive boundary fours, Claudia Cottle hit some lovely attacking strokes down the ground before becoming distracted by her shoe laces and missing a straight delivery. Skipper George did her job by seeing off the accurate Cove opening bowlers until she guided one to gully. Laura Ineson, a returning Sophie Trewin fresh from another flying lesson and Holly Haynes all made contributions but failed to progress and when Simone Hellyer fell Petersfield were in some trouble at 63-7. However the tail wagged and this was to prove one of the big factors on the day. Fifi Goldsmith and Elouise Yarnley added 19 for the 8th wicket and then Elouise added another valuable 12 runs with fellow U13 Nell Chetwood on debut with Petersfield doing well to finish on 96 all out from 29 overs. Cove were by far the happier side at the interval as was Niamh Coughlan who finished with 4 for 14 from her 5 overs.

Holly Haynes and Claudia Cottle opened the bowling for Petersfield and struggled initially with their line until Holly nicked the off stump of Natasha Wightman with an outswinger and then Claudia bowled the opposition skipper with a fast, full delivery and it was game on with Cove 15 for 2. Cove's left handed county batter Rachel Lynch then took the game to Petersfield scoring freely with 5 boundaries in a 23 ball 27 and the Cove team looked set for victory at 48 for 2 however the new leadership team of Lily George and Zoe Stride made the smart decision to introduce the off spin of Simone Hellyer who got Lynch to chip one up to Stride at mid off and when two balls later she clean bowled Coughlan the tide started to turn - well a double wicket maiden does that! Rosalyn Archer put up some good resistance with 17 not out but didn't find any support from the Cove tail as Simone ripped through the lower order bowling two more victims in addition to another Stride catch to finish with 6 overs, 4 maidens and 5 wickets for 13 runs, she even had time to lament her lovely stats when she was finally hit for a boundary in her 4th over having just gone for 1 run before that. That just left Rosie Bruce to wrap up the win with another wicket maiden with Cove all out for 69, falling 27 runs short and moving Petersfield up to 2nd in Division Two of the Ladies Hampshire Cricket League.

Celebratory drinks were then taken in the cove bar courtesy of a very happy Alan Hellyer.