Medlycott praises performance as Purley survive (From Your Local Guardian)

Medlycott praises performance as Purley survive

3:34pm Monday 6th September 2010 in

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Purley coach Keith Medlycott was delighted with his side's character as they recorded a last-ball victory over derby rivals Old Whitgiftians to beat the drop in Surrey Championship Division One.

In a closely fought and exciting encounter, Purley narrowly won the game by five runs as the result went right down to the wire.

Purley scored 254-5 thanks to big scores from Fuaad Syed (65) and Adam Windley (71) and although OWs responded well, Fred Woodrow couldn't hit the required six off the final ball, bowled by Medlycott, to leave them 249-8.

That saw Purley, in the relegation zone for so much of the season, finish eighth to relegate Epsom and Walton-on-Thames.

Medlycott, who put in a good performance himself scoring 33 not out and taking four wickets said: “The way we played was excellent.

"Under that amount of pressure it is testament to how far we have come.

"It was a great game of cricket and obviously it was more important for us but it was a cracking match all the way through.

"We effectively only really turned up for the second half of the summer so it is good that we have improved.

"The last four and five weeks everyone has put a shift in which has been great.

“The job of a coach is to try and continually improve people.

"A lot of people just look at results but it is actually about the way we play and the way people grow.

"I told the boys after the game that a lot of people have grown considerably this year.”

Meanwhile, Addiscombe celebrated three promotions in a row as they won Division Four.

Having started the day in second place, they leapfrogged previous leaders Woking & Horsell with a four wicket win over Sinjungrammarians.

Chasing Sinjungrammarians 144 all out, Addiscombe did slump to 82-6 but a 63-run partnership between Sean Crowie (41) and Scott Benham (17) saw them home.

In the same league, Southern Railway & Kenley finished fifth after a 14 run win over Old Hamptonians while Warlingham, already relegated, went down with a whimper, losing by nine wickets to Mitcham.

They will be replaced in Division Four by Chipstead, Coulsdon & Walcountians who undermined their dominance of Division Five with a thumping 211-run win over Maori Oxshott to finish with 15 wins from their 18 matches.

Croydon MO finished bottom of the pile though with a 36 run loss at Farncombe.

Trinity Mid-Whitgiftian rounded off their disappointing season with a four wicket win over Old Wimbledonians, leaving them eighth in Division Three.