Whitehaven’s encouraging start to the season ended at Sandair where Cockermouth showed there is still life in the side after recent departures.
The Playground team had been optimistic ahead of this latest Cumbria League Premier Division clash as Cockermouth have lost four serious performers at this level.
But inspired by returning professional Shrikant Mundhe Cockermouth won by 37 runs to maintain their own successful start to the campaign.
Mundhe opened the innings and was still there at the end for an outstanding knock of 155no from 149 deliveries, which included 20 fours and three sixes.
After an opening stand of 96 with Reegan Scott (26) he shared in a second wicket partnership of 135 with skipper Matthew Sempill (52).
At the end of their 50 overs Cockermouth had reached 273-4 and, under the circumstances, produced two decent bowling efforts from their 10 overs by professional Terance Warde (0-26) and Jonathan Stewart (1-27).
Warde adopted the sheet anchor role for Whitehaven with 79no from 127 deliveries but there had only been support from openers Chase Young – an explosive 30 off 15 balls, made-up of four fours and two sixes – and Nathan Carmichael (27).
The visitors had reached 236-9 after 50 overs with Josh Brown (4-40) the most successful Cockermouth bowler.
Top scorers on the day were another side who have lost players during the winter – Furness, collecting their first win of 2024.
They made 340-7 against Cleator led by new pro Matthew Kleinveldt (90), and ably assisted by Lewis Gribbin (70), Ryan Griffiths (70), Gareth Smith (38) and Mark Daly (32).
Apart from David Blackwell (2-39) from 9.3 overs the Cleator bowling figures didn’t make particularly good reading.
Connor Hodgson (25) and Blackwell (21) were the leading batsmen in Cleator’s reply, bowled-out for 112 in 33.2 overs.
George Smith had 4-22; Samson Storey took 3-20 and Josh Shaw finished his ten over spell with 3-26.
Carlisle have recovered from their opening day defeat to Keswick to rattle up three straight wins, the latest coming at struggling Egremont.
There’s little doubt that Egremont have a solid recruit in overseas batsman Raghav Kupar but he is being left to do too much on his own.
He was unbeaten on 53 but no other Egremont batsman was in double figures as, after being put in to bat they only managed 98 all out from 44 overs.
Chris Blythe took 3-24 from his ten overs while new recruit Zephania Arinaitwe (3-7) removed the tail.
Carlisle needed only 16.1 overs to knock off the runs, only losing Oliver Spedding (27) with Marc Brown (33no) and Arinaitwe (31no). Kupar was the sole Egremont wicket-taker.
Keswick won again, this time by six wickets at Millom who are still looking for that elusive first victory.
The home side was invited to bat first and they were bowled-out for 86 in 45.4 overs.
Skipper Graham Dawson (26) and new pro Nathan Waterston (19) were the main obstacles of defiance with Risith Upamal (4-13) and Scott McGown (3-10) the leading Keswick bowlers.
Although they lost both openers cheaply Keswick were steadied by Greg Cameron (30) and Upamal (27no) and reached 87-4 for victory in 27 overs.
For Millom Paul O’Callaghan took 2-18 and Dec Tyson had 2-23.
Following promotion Dalton are making one or two people sit up and take notice and they shocked Workington at the Valentine Ground.
Choosing to bat first Dalton made 208-6 in their 50 overs led by Kagiso Rapulana (70), skipper Joe Braund-Smith (64) and Dan Sharpe (31no).
Regan Jackson took 3-50 from his ten overs for Workington.
Jake Daniel top-scored with 43 for Workington and although a few batsmen got a start into the teens nobody could see it through and they were bowled out for 142 in 40 overs.
Sharpe took 4-30 from seven overs for Dalton who are lying third in the table after four games.
Haverigg collected their first win of the season when they made the long trek to Wigton and returned home successful by seven wickets.
Wigton won the toss and decided to bat first, and it was going well qwhen openers Kieran Little (25) and John Reed (25) got them away nicely.
But from 54-2 they slumped to 85 all out in 30.5 overs with nobody else reaching double figures.
Third change Jordan Postlethwaite finished with figures of 7.5-2-7-6 with Robbie Evans taking 3-18.
Although they lost three wickets for 45 it was Jordan Postlethwaite (32no) who saw his side through to victory in the 24th over after brother Drew Postlethwaite had made 26 at the top of the innings.
John Reed took 2-24 from 10 overs for Wigton.
