Kilmington require three points from their final group game against Upottery to top Tier Three East East One.

In their penultimate four-team group game, Kilmington were six wicket winners at home to Ottery St Mary.

Batting first, the Otters were bowled out for 148 with Eddie Rudolph (45), George Mutter (22) and George Southall-Brown (22) the only batsmen to make much progress.

John Short was the star of the Kilmington bowling effort, claiming a ‘fivefer’ as he finished with figures of 5-15 and Tom Olive also bagged a brace of wickets.

Skipper Brett Garner top scored with 40 while Billy Reed hit 33 and John Short completed a fine all-round shift with a knock of 20 as Kilmington chalked up a fourth win of the season.

With the way the points system is worked, even if Upottery defeat Kilmington when the pair meet this Saturday (August 29), they will only muster 82 points and Kilmington already have 80, so three bonus points into the contest and Kilmington will be finishing top regardless of the final score.

Speaking after the game, Kilmington skipper Brett Garner said: “When they won the toss and batted, I was thinking we needed to look at keeping them to something below 200 and, to be fair, all the lads bowled really well – especially Josh [Short] who put the ball consistently into the right areas.

“If we had an issue on the day then it was of our making as we dropped too many ctahces and I am as guilty as the next man on that score!”

Garner, who went into the match looking to avid a third successive first ball duck when batting, was joined by Billy Reed with his side 45-3, but the pair made sure there were no further alarms as they added 80 for the fourth wicket.

Garner said: “I was getting some stick about how life would be with a hat-trick of first ballers so I was very relived to get of the mark! Billy [Reed] did well and we ended up comfortable winners.”

As for the fact that his side do not need to win at Glebe Park on Saturday, Garner said: “We’ll certainly not be going to Upottery thinking about what we need to do to be sure of the points. They are a good side and we will need to be at our best, but, as we approach every game, we will be looking to play on the front foot and playing to win.”