LAMPETER travelled to Llandovery to face a talented and youthful Ammanford 4th XI, in a match crucial to their title aspirations, writes Arif Saad.

With Carmarthen 3rd XI still able to catch them, Lampeter were targeting maximum points, in the hope that Kidwelly 2nd XI, in third place in the league, could take points from their only remaining contender.

Ammanford won the toss and captain Craig Maloney elected to bat first.

The Ammanford goal all season has been to bat out the overs and give their youngsters as much time in the middle as possible.

They did so again with Josh Daniel and Efan Williams opening the batting and following the plan to a tee.

Daryl Davies and Richard Thomas beat the bat repeatedly, bowling with venom and getting the ball to swing viciously.

The batters remained unfazed and glanced with soft hands for runs and defended their stumps when the bowlers straightened their lines.

Thomas was particularly unlucky not to pick up a wicket as several LBW shouts were turned down but finished his 8 overs with 3 maidens and a parsimonious 11 runs conceded.

If the Ammanford batters thought there would be any respite, the change bowlers of Bedwyr Davies and Carwyn Gregson soon disabused them of that notion.

Davies got the ball to swing back in to the batters but could not find a way through their defense.

Gregson challenged the outside edge with pace and bounce and eventually the pressure told when a push to point was excellently stopped by Eifion Davies.

Efan Williams had already called for the run but the return throw, backhanded from a prone position, was gathered by wicketkeeper Arif Saad, who threw down the stumps to run out Josh Daniel for a chanceless 25.

Iori Humphreys joined Efan Williams and continued to frustrate the bowlers, Williams showing courage to rise from a crunching blow which shattered his box, and bat on.

Gregson finished with identical figures to Rich T, 0/11 from 8 with 3 maidens and Bedwyr was not far behind with 0/14 and two maidens.

After a brief experiment with spin saw the scoring rate climb past 3 an over, Ceri Thomas turned to Eifion Davies and Emyr Richards to see out the innings and secure some more bowling points.

Eifion finally broke through Efan’s defenses as he bowled him for a gritty 42.

With 4 and a half overs remaining and 111 runs on the board, captain Craig Maloney promoted himself to number 4 to try to get the score up to a challenging total.

With Iori opening up too, the pair went at a run a ball for the final overs, to take the total to 139/2.

Lampeter began the chase knowing that wickets in hand would be key and in the face of challenging bowling from Aaron Morgan and Craig Maloney, were watchful to begin.

Ceri Thomas timed one off his pads to the square leg boundary but otherwise, runs were hard to come by.

The pressure increased when Craig Maloney produced a peach of a delivery, swinging one back in from outside off to bowl Elgan Evans through the gate for 1. Geraint Lewis and Ceri consolidated, content to play sensibly knowing that the run rate would not be an issue.

Maloney looked particularly dangerous with his in-swingers, and Lampeter chose to see him off for figures of 1/7 from his 5.After 10 overs, Ammanford introduced their spinners, Tomi Maloney bowling off breaks and Pat Daniel left armers from around the wicket.

The pair both challenged the batsmen, consistently finding good lengths and using drift and turn to probe.

Maloney made the big breakthrough, as the in-form Ceri Thomas- the leading run-scorer in the division- went back and across to one from around the wicket.

The umpire adjudged it to have turned back enough to be hitting the stumps and Thomas departed for 11.Pat Daniel at the other end had several big appeals for LBW himself, with both Geraint Lewis and Geraint Thomas surviving, the left arm around angle and bounce giving the umpires doubt.

The two Geraints took Lampeter past 50, Lewis scoring more fluently and Thomas battling away. Eventually, Pat got the breakthrough with the score on 67, Geraint Thomas going back to one and given LBW for 8.At 67/3, with the bowlers on top, Carwyn Gregson attempted to wrest the momentum back in Lampeter’s favour.

Two crunching fours in two balls in his first over set the tone but his breezy knock was brought to an end as Pat picked up his third wicket, spinning one past Gregson’s bat to bowl him for a quick 14.

At the 24 over mark, Lampeter were 87/4 and Ammanford were sensing an upset.

The experienced Eifion Davies came out at 6 and together with Geraint Lewis quashed any fears of a jittery finish.

They saw off Pat Daniel, who finished with 3/19 from his 8 overs and then set about knocking off the remaining runs as Steffan Richards and Arj Dale were introduced.

Despite the mantra of playing sensibly and taking no risks, Eifion still unfurled the reverse sweep and the paddle to good effect and also demonstrated his power as he struck the only six of the match, over long on.

Geraint crossed his half century to applause from the sidelines, a mature innings that played to the match situation and anchored the chase.

He finished 61* as Eifion struck the winning runs in the 32nd over, to give Lampeter a hard-fought 6 wicket victory.

Player of the match went to Geraint Lewis for his match-winning effort with the bat.

As the players from both sides reflected on the match, Lampeter had one eye on the scoreboard from Kidwelly, as Carmarthen Wanderers were under pressure chasing 167. Kidwelly’s bowlers wrapped up the Carmarthen tail to bowl them out for 113 and ensure that with only one round of fixtures to play Lampeter could not be caught and would be confirmed as Clean Rescue Division 10W Champions.