Batting first, Peel Valley had themselves in a good position at the second drinks break (34 overs), but in the proceeding six overs lost five wickets to be bundled out for 166.

The Bush Cricket boys then had Armidale in strife at 5-39 but Benji Marshall (38), John Elliott (44no) and Olly Schumde (25) dug in and guided the visitors to a two-wicket win with four overs to spare.

“We needed to bat a bit deeper,” Peel Valley captain Sam Bowden lamented.

“We fell away a bit too cheaply late in the innings.”

“If we had batted out our 50 and not lost wickets as quickly as we did we could have been in a really good spot.”

“185-190 I really think we could have got there.”

Brett Douglas notched his second half-century in as many games, and was the Peel side’s top-scorer with 53 while Bowden and Rodney Newton both made 30.

Bowden had spoken leading into the game about it being very different cricket to what they usually play.

Not accustomed to batting 50 overs – they only play 30 in the Peel Valley competition – he felt that partially contributed to the collapse.

“There were a couple of lapses in concentration, myself included,” he said.

Dylan Yeomans and Dan Hogan led the charge with the ball for Armidale with three wickets while Elliott snared two.

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Newton was then the early destroyer, backing up his efforts with the bat with 4-11.

He was only a late call-up for Zeb Douglas after he was injured playing on Saturday, although Bowden said he would have been in the side but they were’t sure about his availability.

Despite not getting the result, Bowden said the performance was a step up on the first round against Glen Innes.