Poole Town CC Juniors

The junior season ended with the (now seemingly regular) East Dorset Invitational Cup, which turned out to be a fantastic bookend to the season.

With the weather forecast looking....interesting and Saturday's heavy rain throwing the day into jeopardy, optimism and perseverance won through as all games played out without a hitch.

Drawn against Verwood in the semi, Poole opted to bat and racked up 147 for their 20 overs with Leo Russell (27*) top scoring on a dream debut where he also took a wicket with the only ball he bowled. Contributions from Hitesh Chillakuru (19) who was on loan from Parley CC, Seth Keech (16) and Zosia Scott (16*) saw us amass a competitive total. Well done to Verwood's Harrison Thorne who bowled superbly for his figures of 3-1-16-2

Verwood started well before a flurry of wickets from our accurate bowling and sharp catching saw them fall short of the total, with only Harrison able to reaching double figures.

With news that Bournemouth had beaten Wimborne in the other semi final by just 2 runs, we enjoyed a cracking BBQ courtesy of our hosts and made plans for the final.

In a twist, Wimborne's top run scorer in their semi, John Williams (47), took the field for Bournemouth in the final. However, even his excellent spell with the ball of 4-0-30-3, couldn't put the brakes on our rampant batting order as Jesse Wormington (26), Seth Keech (29), Barnaby Chetwood (44) and Noah Vaughan (30*) led us to an imposing 162.

With Bournemouth not able to keep up with the rate, we chipped away with regular wickets and only Agastya Deshprabhu (25*) was able to make a significant contribution with the bat. In the end, Poole ran out winners by 84 runs to retain the trophy they'd won the previous year.

Huge thanks to everyone who helped organise the day, to our excellent hosts Bournemouth, to the ground staff who enabled the games to go ahead following the rain, to those who scored and umpired, to the parents for their great support and to the players, who all enjoyed one last bit of outdoor cricket for 2026.

Roll on next summer!

U15 Jude Lee hit an exceptional 117 from 155 deliveries in the first innings of Dorset's recent 2 day game over Wiltshire. This proved to be the defining knock of the match as Dorset just got over the line by 2 wickets with a 4 off the final ball of the 2nd innings. Jude also put on a quick 33 in the 2nd innings making him the match's top scorer.

There were also great performances from Harry Wallis (60), Taylor Wormington (43) and Eryk Daly (9-0-33-2)

Brilliant stuff!

Yesterday saw the final league games of the 2026 Season play out, as we saw big successes all across our junior section.

Firstly, a massive well done to our league winners:

Our U11 Dolphins were incredible to finish joint top of U11 Division 1, with absolutely nothing to separate them from fellow league winners Wimborne. The hard work, dedication and consistency from these young cricketers, the majority of which are playing up a year, has been a real source of pride for our coaches.

Our U13 Dolphins were outstanding in U13 Division 2, boasting an unbeaten record as they marched towards the title. Another team where the core of players are playing above their age group, and what a phenomenal achievement to go invincible throughout the season!

Our U15 Piranhas were nip and tuck in a hotly contested U15 Division 3, but came out on top in a final day league decider against Bournemouth Lions to seal the league by just 2 points. Real grit and determination on display right until the end.

Our U15 Dolphins also went undefeated in U15 Division 1, and for many of these players it signifies an end to their junior cricket journey, with all of them already representing the club in our adult section. However, their season continues as they fight to win the biggest prize of all in the national round of the ECB U15 CUP!

Our U13 Girls finished well clear in the U13 Girls league, as they also ran out as undefeated champions. This completed a fantastic double following their cup success a few weeks ago, an incredible achievement!

Our U15 Girls were unbeaten (a theme developing here) as they took home the U15 league title in style. We're really proud of our incredible girls section and these league and cup successes are just the cherry on the top!

There were also great performances in other leagues:

Our U8s ended up 3rd (albeit in a friendly 'league') out of 8 with 6 wins and just 2 defeats.

Our U9s were runners up to Christchurch after a fantastic season of development and improvement

Our U10 Dolphins also were runners up in Division 1, this time to Bournemouth Lions, but got the better of them in the U10 Cup final to cap a fantastic season.

Our U10 Piranhas, a team made entirely of girls playing in a mixed cricket league, finished with 2 wins from 8 games in U10 Division 2

Our U11 Piranhas had a solid mid-table finish in U11 Division 2

Our U12 Dolphins and Piranhas both finished joint 2nd with each other, behind league winners Wimborne by 1 point. Had they not split the series with each other then one of them would have been champions!

Our U13 Piranhas manged to finish Joint 2nd, just 3 points behind league winners Verwood

Finally our U11 Girls ended up 3rd behind a pair of very strong Verwood sides in the U11 Girls league.

What a brilliant season! We can't wait to celebrate it with you all at Poole Park on Sunday 6th September at our Junior Awards Day! 🥳

5 of the best for u12 Harrison Mutton on Monday, as he claimed his maiden 5 wicket haul against Winton U13s, posting figures of 2.4-0-16-5 in a big win for the Dolphins.

Well bowled Harrison, welcome to the honours board

Hot on the heels of our u15s national cup run, is the Dorset Cup Finals Day.

We have 3 teams competing for silverware on a packed day at Canford School.

At 10:00 our u11 and u13 girls square off against Verwood (who qualified today) and Winton respectively.

And at 13:30 our u10s meet Bournemouth Lions, with our juniors looking to retain the trophy they won last year.

There’s lots going on all day, with food and drink available on site.

We’d love as many of you as possible to come down and support our talented juniors.

A big well done to Emma Heckford, who yesterday top scored with 58 from 98 whilst opening for Dorset u16 Girls against Glamorgan.

Well batted Emma!

A 5 star performance from u13 Hugo Williams as he posted figures of 4-0-16-5 for the u13 Dolphins tonight at The Leaze, as Poole Town ran out 102 run winners.

Incredible achievement, well done Hugo!

Under 9s v Winton - Match Report

A tough day at the office for our U9s at PGS on a hot and muggy Saturday morning.

We welcomed Winton, a side we'd beaten convincingly in the away fixture only a few weeks ago.

Bowling first, it was apparent fairly early on that the boys had had a long week in the heatwave, as their fielding didn't live up to their excellent recent standards, their bowling was significantly less accurate than normal, and energy levels were low. Chat was almost non-existent, the upside of which was me not having to hear "Come on Poole, Wicket ball" seven million times. 🤣

Ranga and Louis both took wickets (2 bowled each), Henley took a (slightly dubiously given) caught behind, and Dylan bowled a miserly two overs, but the less said about the overall performance in the field, the better.

56 wides and 10 no balls would prove costly.

Batting was better. Ranga hit some lovely shots in his opening partnership with Leon, top scoring with 18. Henley and Will B both hit some lovely boundaries, but we ended up 36 runs short.

Extras were the difference. As we conceded 112 to their 76.

Well done to the kids to sticking it out in tough conditions after what would clearly have been a long and tiring week as a 9 year old. The boys will learn from it but I wouldn't read too much into the performance - they've been excellent lately.

On to Christchurch next week.

Under 11 Dolphins vs Wimborne Wolves - Match Report

The Leaze was the scene of a pretty crushing defeat during our previous visit, so the Dolphins were eager to improve their fortunes on Saturday morning. We started well with the bat, before an ill advised attempt at a 2nd run saw Jesse well short of his ground on 13. Shortly after we lost our other opener, Seth (10), who was adjudged LBW, with the standing umpire adamant that he hadn't hit the ball first. Fred couldn't quite clear the short cover boundary and in doing so was caught on 7, leaving us in some strife at 39/3. A big partnership was what we needed and Barney and Archie delivered as they so often do, adding 40 to the score before Archie was bowled. Barney retired once again on 28 and our lower order helped us on our way to a very competitive total of 144, with Micah on 12, out LBW as the standing umpire adjudged the ball was hitting the outside of leg stump, Noah on 18 run out as the standing umpire adjudged that the rules for a broken wicket were fairly interpreted by the fielding side, and Kyan with 21 bowled looking to hammer the final ball of the innings.

Confident that we had enough, and with some fire in their bellies from some narrow calls that didn't quite go for them, the Dolphins set about their work diligently. A cracking run out did for the first wicket, Kyan firing it into the bowlers end a Seth doing the rest. We had another catch at gully as Barney found the edge and Fred obliged for the catch. It took a while for our next wicket, but our tight bowling had almost ensured victory by the time it came. And it was Noah who provided all 4 of them. Clean bowling the first, an LBW given by a different home umpire for the second, and then taking 2 in 2 with the last few balls. In the end we ran out 75 run winners.

To put on 144 on a grass wicket we aren't usually confident on was a really good achievement and a testament to how far we've come on as a team, meeting these different challenges head on. Additionally, we gritted our way to a total after a few tight calls that didn't fall for us, where previously we may have crumbled somewhat. Confidence was flowing when we bowled and it really showed, and it was nice to see a 3rd catch in 2 days go to gully. A great win and a great performance, well done Dolphins.

U11 Piranhas vs Verwood

On a quick and very small outfield at Verwood, which was perhaps only nominally 40 yards, Poole put in a strong fielding and bowling performance to limit the opposition to 119.

Ted bamboozled 2 Verwood batters in the 4th over and, whilst Verwood had a markedly bigger and older team than us, we kept chipping away with wickets. Ted completed a cool run out from mid off, before wickets for James (2) and Reuben, albeit while their gun batter retired after some impressive blows.

Despite some good bowling, we couldn't quite remove the Verwood last man in the final 4 overs, as they nudged the score upwards, setting the challenging target of 120.

Special mention to our fielding, which saved us c.15 runs today, notably via several tricky stops near the boundary edge.

Unfortunately, a series of early wickets cost us our chance of chasing this total down, with Verwood being impressive in taking all 4 of the first catching chances that came their way. We were perhaps a tad unlucky that these chances all went to hand, but thereafter James dug in valiantly, and he batted calmly to eventually retire. However, we ended up 38 runs short.

Well done today though Piranhas - this was a solid Verwood team (who secured top spot in the league today) and we gave an especially good account of ourselves in the field 👏