Chesterfield see winning run ended despite skipper’s ton​

Skipper Harry Wilmott scored a century but that was not enough to prevent the home side winning the Division One clash by six wickets.

Chesterfield won toss and, for the first time this season, took first knock on a good batting wicket.

Wilmott opened and batted through his side's 50 overs for 116 not out.

But none of the other batters in the top order reached 20 and Chesterfield, who had won their three previous League matches, slipped to 108-5.

Reece Johnson (36) shared a 60-run sixth-wicket partnership with his captain to lift the visitors' hopes.

But their total of 232-8 threatened to be below par, particularly with Wilmott suffering a leg injury in the later stages of his innings.

That deprived Chesterfield of one of their key bowlers because Wilmott has been in fine form with his off-spin.

The match remained in the balance for the first half of the Duffield run chase.

It could have gone either way with Duffield 108-4.

But Chesterfield conceded 10 penalty runs which, together with 18 wides, meant a whopping total of 37 extras.

Operating for the first time this year with defensive fields, the Chesterfield attack was reliant on seam apart from a few overs of left-arm spin from Johnson who eventually switched to seam himself.

They were unable to build sustained pressure and conceded frequent boundaries as an unbroken stand of 123 between Joe Smith (50 not out) and Zeshan Arif (74 not out) steered Duffield home with eight overs to spare.

The defeat drops Chesterfield to fourth in the table on 78 points, 16 behind leaders Belper Meadows.

*Chesterfield Seconds beat Ambergate by eight wickets at Queen's Park in Division Four North.

Left-arm spinner Sam Fawcett flighted the ball well and beat the bat repeatedly in his 10-over spell yielding 3-18.

Medium-pacer Matt Carrington also bowled well to take 2-16 in mid-innings.

Fellow seamers Barney Kirk (2-17) and Tom Keenan (2-9) made the early inroads and polished off the innings respectively as Ambergate were bowled out for 138.

Opener Alex Fowkes played many fine drives in his 66 not out off 62 balls.

He was well supported by Callum Hiron (24), Fawcett (24) and skipper Adam Woodhouse (20 not out) as Chesterfield stormed to their target in 22 of their 45 overs.

*Belper Amateurs, meanwhile, conceded their fixture at Chesterfield thirds on Saturday.

*On Saturday the first team aim to bounce back against Marehay at Queen's Park while the Seconds travel to Stainsby Hall and the third team are away to Cutthorpe fourths.Chesterfield and Marehay meet again at Queen's Park on Bank Holiday Monday in the first round of the Marston's 61 Deep Trophy.