Essex League Cup Final: Hornchurch hopes hit by Hadleigh

And defeat was a bitter pill to swallow after a couple of highly controversial lbw decisions during their unsuccessful chase.

The Premier Division champions arrived with several of their regulars missing, due to a clash with the wedding of Ronnie Saunders.

Captain Billy Gordon, Paul Murray, Marc Whitlock and Saunders were among the absentees and there was more early drama as wicketkeeper Ted Coney dislocated his elbow when fielding a throw in from the boundary following the first ball of the match.

George Hankins put on the pads as Coney waited to go off to hospital and took a fine diving catch when Paul Tibbenham edged Arthur George behind in the third over.

But Jack Wagstaff and Hadleigh captain Sam Handley rotated the strike well to lead their side to the 15-over drinks break without further alarm.

Wagstaff hit Gavin Griffiths to Luke Edwards in the first over after the restart, though, to end a 66-run stand and Jalpesh Vijay found the edge of Handley’s bat in the next over, with Hankins holding on again behind the stumps.

Vijay then took the gloves and held an edge off Haider Ali Syed Zaidi to give Adeel Malik his first wicket.

Former Hornchurch captain Roy Smith edged the spinner to Hankins at slip to fall for a five-ball duck, before George Clark held onto a running catch to give Hankins a wicket with his off-spin.

And when Sam Rowe was bowled by Malik (3-22), Hadleigh looked in deep trouble at 91-7.

Adam Dobson dug in with Luke Smith for the next eight overs, before he was bowled by Griffiths with the total on 128.

And Smith had more support from Louis Poynter, hitting Hankins for the only six of the innings in his team-high 36 before holing out to Griffiths, who took a fine diving catch on the rope to give George (2-43) his second scalp and end a 45-run stand for the ninth wicket.

Last man Ryan Funnell also chipped in before he was trapped lbw by Griffiths (3-29) in the penultimate over.

But reaching 191 from the depths of being 91-7 was something of a moral victory for Hadleigh, whose total was subsequently boosted to 201 by an additional 10 penalty runs.

And they were soon celebrating in the field as Vijay, having hit Dobson’s first ball of Hornchurch’s reply to the boundary, holed out to Smith.

Edwards edged the next ball through the hands of slip for four, but young Dillon Colar was not so fortunate in Poytner’s first over, falling without troubling the scorers to leave Hornchurch 11-2.

After a couple of nice boundaries off Dobson, past mid-off and over mid-on, Edwards holed out in his next over to make it 35-3.

And there would be no batting fireworks from Hankins this time as, after hitting Poynter for successive boundaries, he edged Dobson behind and Funnell took a catch just above the turf.

Hadleigh turned to spin at both ends after 11 overs, with Zaidi and Handley trying to turn the screw on George Barnacle and Griffiths as Hornchurch reached drinks on 58-4.

Griffiths was bowled by Zaidi soon after the resumption, though, and Handley trapped Barnacle lbw to leave understrength Hornchurch 67-6 and relying heavily on Malik and George.

The seventh-wicket pair got their heads down to keep the scoreboard ticking, slowly, over and brought up the hundred in the 26th over when George pulled Oliver Smith – Hadleigh’s fifth bowler used – for six to the longer leg-side boundary.

Malik cut Zaidi away for four in the next over, but was then given out lbw and showed his bat to the umpire to suggest he felt the decision might have been made in error.

But his departure ended a 42-run stand and left Hornchurch staring into the abyss at 109-7, as young Freddie Barnacle made his way out to the middle.

George fell victim to another contentious lbw decision in the very next over, having hit Smith for successive boundaries to move to 31, and trudged off shaking his head after also suggesting bat had made contact with ball.

Clark clubbed Handley over the pavilion for a big six in the first over after the second drinks break to reduce the target to 67 off 14 – but Barnacle was then bowled by Smith, with Clark holing out off Handley to confirm a 64-run defeat.

Hornchurch can still end their season with more silverware as they take on Walton-on-Thames in the Conference Cup final at Camberley next weekend.