YORK Cricket Club's hopes of repeating their 2012 triumph in the Royal London Club Championship were dashed when they lost to Chester Le Street by eight wickets in the regional semi-final.

It was always going to be a tough assignment on location at the North East Premier League leaders and Simon Birtwistle's third century in a week helped the hosts race to victory with ten overs to spare.

After the start was delayed by rain, York chose to bat and made a bright start as Simon Lambert and Liam McKendry put on an opening stand of 50.

That came to an end when Lambert edged Andrew Bell to Quentin Hughes at slip for 28.

Chris Booth joined McKendry and the tempo of the innings increased as he found the boundary at regular intervals as the ton came up by the 25th over.

Another 23 was added before the partnership was broken when McKendry, having already been dropped once, was caught behind on 38. Booth passed fifty for the second time in this year’s competition and, with Ryan McKendry showing more signs of his recent good form, the visitors had reason to expect a total somewhere around 250 was achievable.

But their fortunes changed dramatically,

Hughes, fielding at cover, stuck out a hopeful hand at McKendry’s powerful low drive and to everyone’s surprise, including the catcher himself, the ball stuck. That was followed quickly by the dismissal of Booth (65), who was given out lbw.

From a dominant position, the visitors were reduced to 164-4 going into the final ten overs. York’s lower order were unable to build on a good start with only Richard Love (13) making double figures as three wickets went down in the space of six overs for the addition of just 23 runs.

Josh Wilson did most of the damage, adding two more wickets to those of McKendry and Booth to finish with 4-34 from eight overs. Charlie Elliot did strike the spinner for six and four in his final over as the visitors eventually reached 200, and he finished unbeaten on 19 as York posted a final total of 212-8.

Birtwistle, the current North East Premier’s leading run scorer, showed his class striking 15 boundaries in the opening fifteen over power-play as York struggled to find any control with the fielding restrictions in place.

By the time they were relaxed, the home side had reached 108 and were in no mood to let up. Despite a positive approach in the field, York were unable to prevent Birtwistle reaching his century off 86 balls as the total passed 150.

The breakthrough finally came in the 31st over when Ryan McKendry held an excellent low catch at cover to dismiss Birtwistle for 118 off the bowling of captain Nick Kay. The skipper picked up a second wicket in his following over when Bell, having just struck a six, failed to clear Lambert at mid-on.

The wickets provided little solace for the visitors as by then the game was beyond them. It was left to Hughes, whose catch in the first innings changed the course of the match, to strike the winning runs while Chris Martin at the other end finished unbeaten on 68.