ATHERTON moved up a league on Sunday, when they visited St Annes of the Northern League in the first round of the National Knockout Competition.

The scheduled 1pm start was put back until 3pm, and the statutory 45 overs reduced to 35. This allowed the rain to clear and the ground to undergo a modicum of drying.

Steve Walsh won the toss for the visitors, and asked the home side to bat. Both sides were without their respective professionals due to ineligibility and Atherton were also minus leading batsmen Phil West who was unavailable.

Atherton used five bowlers, and with each bowling seven overs appeared to have done a good job in restricting the home side to what looked to be a very gettable 133 for six.

Opening bowlers Ian Nuttall and Greg Greenough were particularly effective in returning figures of two for 23 and one for 12 respectively.

But the pick of the five was 17-year-old David Marsh, bowling in only his second senior match with one for 28.

St Annes' captain Russell Bradley and Steven Bickerdike posted 29 and 39 respectively.

Unfortunately for the visitors, their reply soon became derailed, losing their first wicket with a total on four, and although the bowling was accurate the early order batsmen contributed to their own downfall, with the exception of Paul Brown who was bowled by left arm seamer Joe Davies, with probably the best ball of the day.

This left too much to make up for the lower order, and the innings closed on 75 all out after 32 overs. The only batsman to get into double figures were Chris Partington with 12 and Philip Wakefield with 15.

St Annes ran out winners by 58 runs, and advance into the next round.