Cookham Dean CC kicked off their Thames Valley League campaign on Saturday with the 1st and 3rd XIs both picking up thrilling 8 run wins while the 2nds slipped to a four wicket defeat.

At Tring Park, the 1st XI batted first against Tring Park 2nds, posting 192-6 from their 52 overs. Tom Bibby's 55 and Rory Millar's 43 were the mainstays of the innings and Tom Wells-Cole added some late impetus with 27 not out. In reply, the Dean took early wickets but Taylor (45) and Baker (52) appeared to be steering the home side to victory. When these two fell however, wickets fell regularly and when Aaron O'Donoghue took a catch on the mid-wicket boundary off Chris Nunn, CDCC had picked up an eight run win! Nunn took 3-48 while Sav Gandesha's bowling recovered well from the previous week's mauling with 3-40 off 11 overs.

The 2nds fell to a four wicket defeat against an impressive Farnham Royal 2s outfit at Ricketts Field. Cookham batted first and the top order quickly crumbled. It was left to Jake Richardson to marshall his side to respectability with a well made 61. His main support came from Mark Anderson who hit 24 to help the hosts to 150 all out. Ali Damirchi and Isaac Richardson made some early inroads but 150 was never likely to be enough as Royal finished six wickets down with just over two overs to spare. Damirchi and Anderson each taking two wickets apiece.

The 3rd XI picked up a thrilling win at North Maidenhead to make it three straight league wins over Marlow 3s. Cookham lost the toss and were put into bat where Jonathan Gay (17) and Matt Wells-Cole put on 67 for the first wicket in 17 overs. Wells-Cole carried on after Gay was caught at cover and brought up his first senior 50 in partnership with Roger Evans (33). Wells-Cole eventually fell for 78 and a collapse started as they went from 145-1 to 178 all out. Paul Taylor and Daniel Matthews each took an early wicket as wickets fell at regular intervals. Cleave however took the game to Cookham making a well-paced 50 that looked set to guide Marlow to victory. When he was the 8th wicket to fall (Sam Gardner's 4th catch of the innings) and 10 runs were still needed, the game swung back in Cookham's favour and Mark Powell and Jack Turner finished the game off to ensure a winning start to the league season.

The Sunday XI were on the receiving end of a heavy defeat to Ramgarhia. CDCC batted first and quickly slumped to 7-5. Jayson McAlpine, in his first game for the club, and Christian Austin helped to rebuild their side's fortunes however. McAlpine made 29 while Austin ended on 54 not out to reach some sense of respectability at 111 all out. Austin and James Taylor each took an early wicket but Ramgarhia set about their chase rapidly, winning with over 17 overs to spare and only 3 wickets down.