Sawston & Babraham captain Callum Guest takes five-for in Thurlow Nunn East Anglian Premier League victory over Bury St Edmunds
Captain Callum Guest led by example as Sawston & Babraham (181-5) maintained their winning start to new Thurlow Nunn East Anglian Premier League season with a five-wicket triumph over Bury St Edmunds on Saturday (176-9).
While Guest, who took over as skipper from Dan Heath ahead of the 2025 campaign getting underway, has often produced the goods with the bat down the years, it was his performance with the ball that caught the eye on this occasion at the Spicers Sports Ground.
His 10 overs yielded a return of 5-7, with six maidens thrown into the bargain for good measure.
The visitors’ top order had no answer to Guest’s bowling. He removed Bury’s opening four batsmen of Wayne Routledge (8), Alex Maynard (0), Will Jarman (0) and Harry Gallian (1) for a combined team score of just 13.
Guest also accounted for the wicket of Bury all-rounder Tom Rash (2) to leave the away side toiling on 18-6 after just 12.4 overs.
With that in mind, the away team from Suffolk did remarkably well to reach their final total and at least give the hosting champions something to chase down.
That was in no small part down to the display of Alex Cruickshank, who soaked up 85 deliveries on his way to a score of 45 before he was run out by Ethan Rice.
Oliver Riddick also ensured that the Bury tail wagged with an unbeaten score of 43 runs off 49 balls, while Ben Whittaker and the experienced Justin Bishop contributed 25 and 22 respectively to help push their side closer towards the 200-run mark.
With Guest dominant, the remainder of the wickets to fall were shared around by the rest of Sawston & Babraham bowling attack with one apiece for James Vandepeer (1-28), Tarun Mouli (1-39) and Mark Smith (1-60).
However, Guest was unable to replicate his bowling exploits with the bat. Opening up the reply alongside Yousuf Choudhary, Guest’s wicket was snared by Rash for nine, while his partner also headed back to the pavilion early having made only five.
Rice – batting at number three – then fell for 28 to leave Sawston & Babraham on 51-3 to give Bury the slightest of hopes of an unlikely victory.
But all-rounder Ben Claydon duly dashed those small glimmers of optimism with a half century to steady the innings.
His wicket was eventually taken by Whittaker for 53, but by that point Sawston & Babraham were less than 50 runs from their target with five wickets still in hand.
For Claydon, he moved his individual total for the season on to 220 in three outings, leaving him third on the division’s early run-scoring chart behind the Sudbury combination of Adam Jones (238) and Darren Batch (223).
It was left to winter addition Henry Wilson (28 not out) and Ben Clilverd (17 not out) to complete the job for the Rams, who will put their 100 per cent winning record on the line again on Saturday (10 May) when they play host to Copdock & Old Ipswichian.
