At the seventh time of asking it's a winning Woodbury!

IT HAS been a long time coming, but Woodbury have finally recorded their first win of the Francis Clark Devon Cricket League season.

After six straight defeats, it was a case of seventh time lucky as the villagers defeated Roborough by seven wickets.

It was a fine all-round performance, with first the ball and then the bat, that saw Woodbury to victory.

The visitors were asked to bat first and three early wickets from James Kavanagh reduced them to 31-3.

Wickets fell at regular intervals thereafter, rendering them all out in just 37.5 overs for a meagre 73.

Kavanagh finished with four wickets, returning splendid figures of 4-27, whilst Kevin Miller sent down 13 exceptional overs for his 3-15 and there were also wickets for Martin Cook (2-15 from eight overs) and skipper James Taylor (1-13).

The Woodbury reply was hamstrung by the early departures of both Greenslade and Smale with only a dozen on the board but skipper Taylor came in, steadied the ship with a knock of 13 and played the supporting role to Kavanagh (36no) and the other not out batsman, when victory was confirmed, was Miller, completing a fine all round contribution with his ten runs.

Skipper James Taylor said: "We have opened our account for the season. It's been a while coming, but, hopefully, we can launch our season from here and look to make speedy progress up the table."

The victory lifts Woodbury off the foot of the table and next up is a visit to the side who now occupy that basement berth, Roborough.

Woodbury are now off the bottom of the league go to bottom club Roborough on Saturday.