Local cricket: New Brighton lift themselves off the slab to record thrilling win after Ian Cockbain onslaught

As the ball rolled out of the car park and into Mortuary Lane, seemed dead and buried.

’s Ian Cockbain had just launched Seb Botes clean over the pavilion for the biggest of his seven sixes on the way to 162*, a brutal and brilliant onslaught which threatened to put the game beyond the hosts.

Though it may have felt like an act of mercy at the time, Calum Turner’s decision to call a halt at 260/3 from 51 overs was a pragmatic one. Four more overs and they’d have been beyond 300, and Cockbain closing in on a double - but the pitch was true and the outfield flat, and creating 10 chances wouldn’t be easy.

And somehow, Adam Neal’s side raised themselves off the slab. There was no bolt of lighting out of the mizzle that settled over Rake Lane - instead, they put together a whole that was greater than the sum of its parts and won by one wicket.

“It was a great advert for cricket in the Comp, and a great credit to both teams,” Neal said, having seen his gamble to field first just about pay off.

“If they’d gone to the full 55 overs, it would have been a different game - but they left enough for us to want to have a go.

“Cockbain really took it away from us. He batted incredibly well, probably one of the best knocks I’ve seen in the Comp.

“But we knew if two or three of their really strong players got in, we knew we were going to be chasing a big score - that was always part of our game plan.”

Recruited after a winter making a name for himself in T20 franchise leagues around the world, Cockbain was on another planet. He put on 90 with Will Porterfield as a steady foil, then 141 with Sam Oldham as a giddy accomplice.

There were chances, and air shots - but once he’d settled in, Cockbain’s century seemed inevitable. He took 11