Wellington took 24 points from their rain affected Somerset League Division One match against Ashcott & Shapwick at the Playing Field on Saturday writes Mark Saunders.

Batting first the Ashcott batsmen got stuck into the Wellington bowling attack early on with opener Callum Haggett – last season’s Somerset League Best Youth Player – hooking the ball particularly well before he perished to the nagging line and length of Simon Rudd for a well made 24.

Villis and A&S’s South African Niedermayer then set about the bowling playing beautifully as they took the score onto 91 in only the fifteenth over before Niedermayer made the mistake of trying to take a quick single to mid off only to see Thom Trott throw down the stumps in magnificent fashion to run him out for a quickfire 34.

This then allowed Wellington to begin to peg back the run rate as 91-2 soon became 96-5 due to a ‘marathon’ eight over spell from Adrian Lee who took 2-34 and Rudd who finished with the excellent analysis of 12-5-32-2 – a great effort against one of the division’s strongest batting line ups.

However Ashcott then steadily rebuilt their innings with a partnership of 90 between D.Rudge and B.Rudge.

This was interrupted on a few occasions by rain which meant that tea was taken with 7 overs of the visitor’s innings remaining.

Once play resumed Ashcott finished on 211-8 with a wicket each for Julian Smit (1-44) and Paul Short (1-53).

The rain continued to disrupt play throughout the remainder of the game, reducing Wellington’s innings to a maximum of 39 overs in which to score the required runs.

In actual fact the weather conditions allowed only 21 overs to be bowled as Wellington finished on 89-2 with Rob Moysey (43 not out) and Julian Smit (25 not out) playing some pleasing shots before the umpires decided that no more play was possible and the match was abandoned as a draw.

Wellington stay fifth with 290 points and face a tough match at league leaders Chew Magna next time out.

The match ball for this fixture as kindly sponsored by AIS Cleaning Services Ltd (01823 272260).