No great escape for sorry Studley (From Redditch Advertiser)

No great escape for sorry Studley

2:29pm Wednesday 19th September 2012 in Sport

CRICKET STUDLEY suffered inevitable relegation from the Birmingham League after being on the receiving end from a Stourbridge side hell-bent on winning promotion back to Division Two.

Stourbridge posted a testing target of 244-6 and then promptly made light work of Studley’s batting in reply as they were removed for 111.

The defeat means Studley are resigned to playing Warwickshire League cricket next season but club stalwart Brandon Miller remains optimistic about their relegation.

He said: “I don’t think it’s the worst thing that could have happened to the club — it’s not the end of the world.

“We need to get back and start enjoying our cricket. When you lose a lot of games, you lose confidence as well.”

Miller believes the wet weather hit them harder than most.

He added: “Studley’s ground doesn’t drain well. As a result, we haven’t been able to train anywhere near enough this season.

“The weather was so horrendous at times, that I think a few players started to losing interest.

“I always believe you get out of things what you put in.

“As a result, we haven’t batted well all season and you can’t blame the weather for everything.

“We’ve been getting out to poor shot selection and we’ve not scored enough runs. We simply haven’t applied ourselves enough.

“There’s no major difference between Division Three of the Birmingham League and the Warwickshire Premier Division other than you might get a few weaker sides at the bottom of the league.

“If we can keep hold of all our players, and I see no reason why we can’t, then there’s no reason why we can’t be positive about next season.

“Geographically, recruitment at Studley has always been difficult, Redditch have the same problem. “But I believe we can bounce back from this.”