A potential season defining weekend for Timperley first team ended in double heartache losing to Nantwich in the league and then Hyde in the last eight of the Cheshire Cup - both being remarkably similar home defeats instigated with what is looking like a ever familiar middle order collapse.

Timperley restricted Nantwich to a very respectable 188 courtesy of some good and controlled bowling with Jonathan Fowler the standout with four wickets. Two excellent cameo spells for Nathan Brown and Caedence Kuepper brought the boys in buoyant at the innings break looking to chase down a crucial home win.

After making a good start to the chase with the ever reliable Jamie Matthews and Viraj Sorathia, the Timperley batting line up collapsed with a mixture of some highly skilled bowling, particularly from the visitors Jimmy Warrington.

He's a finisher at a car plant near Crewe so it was appropriate he polished off Timperley with five wickets from 28 runs!

Home skipper Ed Galley said that there was some poor application to grind out runs in a pressure situation - and that was the reason his team eventually fell 69 runs short of the Nantwich total.

Twenty four hours later it was repeat horror show against Hyde in the quarter final of the Cheshire cup.

Galley said: "It was a very similar batting collapse to the Saturday game. We never really got under way with the consistent falling of wickets. Callum Yates eventually top scoring with 28 batting at number 10, putting to shame the batsman ahead of him. Finishing on 152, this gave us something to bowl at and some hope of a win if we got early wickets".

"Unfortunately this didn’t happen and Hyde cruised to their target to knock us out of the cup.A tough weekend for us but onwards and upwards."

Meanwhile the table topping Timperley second team had a morale-boosting triumph against second place Nantwich....and skipper Shahnawaz Khan was in tip top form with the ball effectively ending their chase with five wickets for 14.

Timperley had scored 232 with teenager Rohan Palmar notching 78 and the home side crumbled to 125 with four of them ducked.

It was a brilliant day for the Timperley Academy team on Sunday who recorded their first win this season when they put Elworth thirds to the sword.

Fifteen year old Jamie Spencer was man of the match with his career best quickfire 64 followed by three wickets for nine runs. Timperley scored 197 and the high-riding visitors were all out for 109 with coach Matt Clark describing his team's performance as "absolutely tremendous."

A crucial away derby this Saturday at Bowdon could end up a season definer for TCC as they teeter just above the relegation zone - full points on Saturday could very well start the resurgence as Galley and co look to retain Prem status going into the 2025 season.