Ashington Cricket Club start their league season with an eight wicket victory against Tynedale

After a frustrating first few weeks to the campaign due to the wet weather, play started on time in bright and warm sunshine.

Sean McCafferty’s side wasted no time in exerting pressure onto their Hexham-based opponents – who had elected to bat first – as they had them reeling at 17-6 early doors.

Opener Joe Barber was the first to fall, run out by Adam Nichol then, in the space of two overs, right arm seamer Matty Collins missed out on a hat-trick but nevertheless claimed three wickets in two overs after removing skipper Daniel Parker, Ted Fletcher and Will Marrow.

Ashington professional Jeremiah Louis added to Tynedale’s misery as he weighed in by taking the scalps of Matthew Platts and Jamie Crichton.

However, in danger of being routed, the visitors dug deep to stage a gallant recovery.

Edward Foreman and Nathan Byerley added 33, but it was a last wicket partnership of 68 between Aaron Rourke (61) and Archie Fletcher (13 not out) which propelled Tynedale’s score up to a very respectable all out total of 148 from 40.4 overs.

In Ashington’s reply, Nichol was an early casualty, bowled by Archie Fletcher for six, but two excellent partnerships between Jack Jessop and Jack McCarthy then McCarthy and McCafferty cemented a comfortable win for the Mighty Acorns with 17 overs to spare.

The Jessop/McCarthy stand was worth 86 when the latter – on 44 – spooned a return catch to Ted Fletcher then, when Jessop hit the winning runs with a huge leg side six, he had added 58 with McCafferty.

Player of the Match Jessop struck the innings of the day. His unbeaten 71 came from 95 deliveries and included six boundaries.

He said: “We’ve lost a couple of players over the winter in Ben O’Brien and Mitchell Killeen so we need to make sure our batting unit fires. There is a big onus on the top five or six (batsmen) to score the runs so I was really happy to bat through and end with an unbeaten half century.”

On Friday night, Ashington lost to South Northumberland in their Group T20 clash.