BUDE skipper Warren Rumble wants his side to ‘push for promotion’ from Division Two East of the Bond Timber Cornwall Cricket League this summer.

The North Cornwall side have started promisingly in seeing off St Blazey and St Minver, although they were beaten by table-toppers Grampound Road seconds on the opening day.

Saturday’s clash at promotion favourites Callington seconds fell foul of the weather, leaving them fourth, four points off second-placed Wadebridge seconds.

Unsurprisingly, Rumble, who leads the divisional batting charts with 256 from just three outings in his first campaign in charge since taking over from Mark McManus, has been pleased with what his side have produced.

He said: “I’ve been really happy so far. In our first game against Grampound Road we didn’t have our best team out, but we came up against a young batsman in Harry Matthews who won them the game, and then we went down to St Blazey.

“I won the toss and did what most people don’t do down there and chose to bowl. We restricted them to 202 thanks to big Shaun Whitefield who did a brilliant job running up the hill for us, and then although we fell to 30 odd for three, we were seen home by my 104 not out and an unbeaten 48 from Matt Williams.

“St Minver at home saw them win the toss on a belting batting pitch, but they could only make 193.

We had Sam Hockin making his first appearance since rejoining from Werrington and although he wasn’t happy with how he bowled and he hadn’t bowled since last season, he took 3-39 and was well supported by Shaun and James Findlay. We easily knocked it off for one thanks to my 84 and Matt Hookway’s unbeaten 73.”

Rumble believes they have the tools to be in the promotion hunt come September, but knows consistency is key.

He said: “It was disappointing that Saturday’s game was called off but we had three missing with one getting married and two working, so it wasn’t the worst week for it to be rained off.

“But that said, all three are back in this week and we’ve already chosen our team for Saturday which is a lovely position to be in.

“We want to push for promotion and with consistency in selection and players turning up for training, I believe we can have a good go at doing that.”

Rumble is a personal trainer by day and is taking a more structured approach to the job.

He said: “We’ve been looking at fielding quite a lot and when we’re batting we spend the last two minutes of our net working on range hitting so that when we need to up the run rate in a game, we’re capable of doing it.

“Another thing we’re doing is a warm-up before the game to ensure everyone is switched on and to prevent injury.”

Tintagel are the visitors to Crooklets for a local derby on Saturday, and Rumble admits he doesn’t know too much about them.

He said: “I have no idea what to expect from them really as I haven’t played against them for a long time and they came up, so we’ll focus on ourselves. We’re going into it very confident as we’ve got lots of players in form and everyone’s available. We just hope the weather helps us out.”

One man Tintagel will know little about is left-hander Wayne Adams, who will line up for Bude in the top order.

Rumble said: “As well as Sam being back, this year we’ve got Wayne Adams for his first proper league season with us. He played a few games for us in the Bond Timber Trophy in the 2020, and he’s a good all-round cricketer. He’s been batting for us in the top four and is capable of bowling some handy overs.”

Elsewhere on Saturday, Bude’s second team will look to build on their first victory of the season at St Austell thirds last time out when they make the short trip to winless Werrington thirds in Division Three East (1pm).

Bude first team for Saturday —

W Rumble (captain), M Hookway, W Adams, T Hall, C Gliddon, S Hockin, M Mansbridge (wicketkeeper), M Williams, S Whitefield, J Findlay, J Horwell.