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The Sweep 2026 Week 2: Ben Griffiths comes home with a ton
- Cornwood Cricket club
- May 11
- 7 min read
Words: Simon Travers
Match Photos: Ivor Thomas
Finally, someone let us out of our cage. After a week of nervously scrolling weather apps to predict if the clouds would roll in exactly the same way they did last week, it turned out that there was plenty enough sunshine in our bag for a full weekend of cricket. That weekend started in style on Friday night as the clubhouse was packed for the Cornwood Quiz. 10 teams with around 50 contestants were put to task on subjects from motorway service stations to how long a line you can write with an HB pencil. The winning team were Quizlamic State, a collaboration of Hewitts and Martyns. That means that Chewy remains the club’s undisputed Universal Quiz Champion. Acknowledge him! More importantly, a huge shout out goes to the kitchen and bar staff who, combined with serving youth training earlier, put in a double shift to make the evening a roaring success. They are heroes one and all.
On Saturday, the Ones headed to the seaside to face last season’s Premier Division runners up, Paignton. The rivalry between the two teams has been fairly evenly matched over the years with Cornwood winning 7 and Paignton 10 of their 24 previous fixtures this century. Both sides faced availability challenges and a playing surface that could be politely described as healing from the rugby season. Factor in interrupted preparations because of rain and it was hard to predict which way the match would flow.
Elliott Staddon, now stand in captain as Matt Skeemer was unavailable, won the toss and elected to field and the Queen’s Park pitch took spin from the off. Mohsin Khan was tossed the new ball and took 10 deliveries to make an impact as Paignton opener Noah Wright edged to Elliot Staddon in the third over. Mohsin found Luke Medlock’s edge too in the 9th over as he was caught by George Thompson. Lee Baker’s introduction increased the Cornwood advantage. Lee has previous with the Paignton middle order and he proved too good for them again, removing both captain Harry Ward and overseas player Ayabulela Gqamana on the way to stellar figures of 10-3-19-3. Paignton were 68-5, but while most home batters struggled, Brenton Pedley was firing at the other end. He hit a run-a-ball 76 with 10 fours and 3 sixes to give the Paignton innings momentum. The One’s seamers found it hard to support the efforts of the twirlers and their advantage slipped. Charlie Ward (50 from 70) and Connor Ashworth (52 from 67) took the home side to a slightly above par total of 234. Elliott Staddon fought well to get figures of 3-51 and Mohsin Khan claimed another late wicket to finish on 3-27.
In reply, openers Ryan Rickard and Charlie Finan saw off the new ball well. They put on 54 for the first wicket in 10.4 overs, with Charlie hitting a boundary every 3.57 deliveries before being caught for 30. Ryan Rickard was able to push on to 39 from 63 balls but after that, wickets tumbled regularly. Again, it was spin that did the damage for Paignton, as Rory Medlock took 3-25 in his 10 overs. Cornwood’s middle and lower order found it difficult to find fluency and couldn’t get the run rate above 3 an over after Rickard was out. The result was that the side were bowled out for 151, a long 83 runs short of the Paignton target.
Elsewhere in the Premier Division, Exmouth backed up their pre-season talk of a potential league and cup double by comfortably dispatching champions Bradninch & Kentisbeare, Plymouth won a tight one at Hatherleigh, Sandford out-batted Exeter and Tavistock might have raised a few eyebrows by thrashing Sidmouth to the tune of 199 runs. Elliot Hamilton hit 151* and took 3-6, while Matt Petherbridge claimed 4-19. Cornwood are sixth in the table, highest of the teams yet to record a win.
At Oak Park, The Twos rolled the scoreboard past 300 in their first home game for the second year running as Paignton 2XI visited to complete an inter-club double header. The main engine of the innings was provided by the return of Ben Griffiths after two years in Cornwall. Ben lives and dies by the drive and his co-ordination was working from the first ball. He put pressure on the Paignton bowlers with seven boundaries in the first ten overs. His power was matched by a willingness to exploit the long boundary down the slope to run. Ben and Alex Robinson were able to run two 2s and two 3s in an eventful ninth over. Griffiths reached his 50 in 47 balls and while it became harder to find the boundary as the field spread, every opportunity for a quick single was exploited. Ben kept pushing until the thirty first over, when he reached his ton in 101 balls. He was then soon dismissed for 102 from 108 with 11 fours and 1 six. Ben was ably supported by an impressive debut knock from young Josh Brookes. Josh has moved over from Tavistock and looked nervous early on, skittishly playing and missing. As he settled though, Josh showed a range of intelligence and power with sharp running between the wickets and well-timed pull shots. He kept the innings momentum flowing after Ben was out and reached 87 from 82 with 9 fours and a six before being caught and bowled George Woodcock.
At tea, the match felt done and dusted as the Twos had posted a total of 310-6. However, Paignton provided a good account with the bat to frustrate the Cornwood bowlers. Leading the charge for the visitors was Devon Cricket League legend, Neil Hancock. Twenty years ago in 2006, Neil was top of the Premier Division batting averages with 900 runs at 69.23. Now, like the 2006 movie Rocky Balboa, Neil doesn’t have speed anymore, and his knees can’t take the pounding, so he called upon some ‘good ol’ fashioned blunt force trauma’ that rattled the ancestors of Oak Park.
Hancock smashed 71 from 65 balls with 10 fours and 2 sixes before falling to the first of two classy catches from Ewan Grewal. Once Hancock was gone, the Paignton batters continued to press, with 35 from 26 from captain Carl McFarlane, and an impressive partnership of 60 between youngsters Ethan Hancock (28 from 22) and Harry Roberts (33 from 22) to close on 267-6. There were two wickets for Adam Goodliffe and Alex Robinson as the Twos won by 43 runs.
Over the track at Delamore Park, the Threes faced off in a local derby against Plympton 2XI. Plympton won the toss elected to bowl with a strong attack. Aviral Srivastava continued his good early season form with 47 from 56 as the Threes batters worked hard to build a platform of 87-3 in 24.1 overs. From that point, Joe Coppola’s (3-24) awkward length and pace troubled the edges of the Three’s middle order. Wickets started to fall and the Threes were all out for 154 in 43 overs. After tea, the Threes made early progress and looked like they might make a game of it when Jack Lane took two wickets in the first six overs. However, Kristian King (34) and Jack Martin (42) were able to make 76 for the third wicket and that decisively swung the game, even as Josh Whiting removed them both late on. Plympton got home with six wickets remaining and plenty of overs. One huge positive for the Threes was the return of Ollie Mitchell to the side after a year’s layoff because of injury. It wasn’t Ollie’s day statistically but it was great to see him back on the park.
The Fours didn’t play on Saturday because there are 9 teams in G Division West this year and it was their bye week. However, it was a busy week for the socials. Thursday saw the start of of the P&D campaign as Mick’n’Rocky’s Astro Army faced up against a strong enough Plympton side in the P&D Cup. Plympton batted first and put on 186-2 in their 18 overs. Finn Torley (still batting in a Cornwood shirt, he loves us so) crunched 51 from 37 while Kristian King made 57* from 47. Oliver Goulder’s 46 from 20 included 4 sixes and put the game out of realistic reach. Sam Gibbs bowled economically and Charlie Martyn got less reward than his spell deserved. In reply, Cornwood scored 146-6. Rocky Travers made 46 from 41 up top before Ewan Grewal hit 57 from 24 including 8 fours and 3 sixes as the light faded. Ewan became the first player that I’ve seen to manage to hit a Delamore Park six through the main door of the clubhouse.
On Sunday, the Fives travelled to Harberton for a social match with a feisty edge. Harberton scored 162 in 30 overs. Eoin Hewitt lead the bowling attack with impressive figures of 5-3-8-3. Oscar Edling-Smith, Harvey Smith and Julian Burrows all had quality bowling spells too. The Fives posted a score of 138 in reply to finish 24 runs short. Nathan Parsons did Nathan Parsons things with 31 from 14 including 5 fours and a six. Tino Machaka will also be happy to get his season rolling with a strong 27 from 38 balls.
In the Colts section, the Under 11s were up against it for a second week with a match against a Tier 2 Plymouth side. It was tough early going but openers Freddie and Sam showed the bravery and resilience you need for the role. Harriet hit 15 with 3 fours to top score. Plymouth were able to get 34 more runs than the Under 11s, but Ellie, Rosie, Florence and Sam took a wicket. Under 13s Tier 1 were beaten by Plymouth by 92 runs on Thursday but Rehaan bowled an excellent spell of 4-0-18-2. On Sunday, the Girls Under 13 team had a close match against Tavistock before running second against Plymouth in a three team tournament.
Next week, I can already tell you that the headline story will be taken by the Under 11s as they defeated Plymst**k on Monday night for their first win of the year. Saturday will be a great day to get to Oak Park as the Ones are home to Sandford and the barbeque will be firing after the match. The Threes will also be at home against Bridestowe & Belstone 2XI. The Twos head north to Hatherleigh while the Fours enter the steel cage for a no holds barred contest at Whitchurch. There are two Sunday matches happening as the Women’s First XI are home to Plymouth while the Fives take on Modbury.
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