The season may only be in its infancy but it's quickly become apparent that St Cross Symondians are probably going to be the team to beat in ECB Southern Premier League cricket this summer.
They look a pretty formidable outfit with plenty of squad depth and after back-to-back Premier Division wins and an ECB national club championship victory brace, the season has begun on a hugely promising note.
They followed up an eight-wicket Matt Howarth inspired win over Alton with a crushing 107-run defeat of Basingstoke & North Hants.
Then beat Wiltshire-based WEPL outfit Burbage & Easton Royal by six wickets to progress in the NCKO.
Beaten by Burridge in last seasons title decider, St Cross contrived to find themselves in early strife at 46-4 after being put into bat at May's Bounty - the out-swing of Joe Oates (4-27) accounting for two of the three wickets to fall with the total stuck on 46.
They look a pretty formidable outfit with plenty of squad depth and after back-to-back Premier Division wins and an ECB national club championship victory brace, the season has begun on a hugely promising note.
They followed up an eight-wicket Matt Howarth inspired win over Alton with a crushing 107-run defeat of Basingstoke & North Hants.
Then beat Wiltshire-based WEPL outfit Burbage & Easton Royal by six wickets to progress in the NCKO.
Beaten by Burridge in last seasons title decider, St Cross contrived to find themselves in early strife at 46-4 after being put into bat at May's Bounty - the out-swing of Joe Oates (4-27) accounting for two of the three wickets to fall with the total stuck on 46.
Left-hander Charlie Gwynn (50) and Guernsey all-rounder Matt Stokes, with 72, turned things around in a near-century fifth wicket stand which eased St Cross to 141-5.
Gwynn, with two sixes and six boundaries, was going nicely until he slapped a head-high catch to mid-wicket, but Stokes quickly found an ideal partner in emerging teen prospect Ben Foster, who went on to score a maiden Premier Division fifty.
Stokes, who will become an enormous asset to St Cross when his Channel Islands teaching commitments allow, sent a return catch to Ash Neal at 207-5.
That gave centre stage to Foster, who played some handsome shots - he struck a six and five boundaries in a run-a-ball 51 - before holing out on the boundary. St Cross closed at 254-9.
Basingstoke slipped to 33-3 - Gwynn twice taking catches off Stokes (2-36) - but were revived by an enterprising stand between George Metzger (49) and Dubs Wood (35), who added 71.
But with the Basingstoke reply at 104-3, a misunderstanding led to Wood being run out. Any prospect of a Bounty win, however unlikely, disappeared.
Spin pair Callum Willock (3-35) and Gwynn (2-22) sliced through the Stoke lower order to leave the Bountymen 147 all out and nursing a heavy defeat on their Premiership return.
Gwynn, with two sixes and six boundaries, was going nicely until he slapped a head-high catch to mid-wicket, but Stokes quickly found an ideal partner in emerging teen prospect Ben Foster, who went on to score a maiden Premier Division fifty.
Stokes, who will become an enormous asset to St Cross when his Channel Islands teaching commitments allow, sent a return catch to Ash Neal at 207-5.
That gave centre stage to Foster, who played some handsome shots - he struck a six and five boundaries in a run-a-ball 51 - before holing out on the boundary. St Cross closed at 254-9.
Basingstoke slipped to 33-3 - Gwynn twice taking catches off Stokes (2-36) - but were revived by an enterprising stand between George Metzger (49) and Dubs Wood (35), who added 71.
But with the Basingstoke reply at 104-3, a misunderstanding led to Wood being run out. Any prospect of a Bounty win, however unlikely, disappeared.
Spin pair Callum Willock (3-35) and Gwynn (2-22) sliced through the Stoke lower order to leave the Bountymen 147 all out and nursing a heavy defeat on their Premiership return.