SPL Division One cricket: New Milton sink Portsmouth

SPL Division One
New Milton CC 230
Portsmouth CC 209-8

NEW Milton returned to winning ways after picking up their fourth league win of the season with a 21-run victory over Portsmouth at St Helens Ground.

The visitors made a poor start to their innings, but Ben Griffiths (50) and Lee Beck (49) sparked a revival before Joe Hall (3-25) removed three of Portsmouth's biggest hitters.

Both New Milton openers, James Adams and Ryan Beck, fell for five runs. However, this brought Griffiths and Lee Beck together, and the duo proceeded to add 69 runs for the third wicket when Griffiths was bowled by Rakshith Rao (2-55) at 90.

After sharing a 41-run partnership with Campbell Golding (22) and 27 runs with George Watts (15), Lee Beck returned to the pavilion one run shy of a half-century after facing 75 balls.

A superb tail-end performance from Hall (34) and Ed Bartlett (22) helped New Milton side reach 230.

Portsmouth started well, adding 60 before Hall's blitz removed Jack Marston (21), Ben Duggan (39) and Minhaj Jalill (10) to leave the hosts at 82-3.

Portsmouth refused to quit, and they soon made it to 182-6 after three LBWs, two from Ryan Beck (2-42) and one from captain George Watts (1-29). However, the hosts were running out of overs, and they ultimately finished 21 runs short of the target.

New Milton's other wickets came from Ed Barlett (2-40).

New Milton travel to the Isle of Wight on Saturday to take on Ventnor at 12.30pm.