Angry skipper John Wood will report the Woodlands pitch to the Bradford League after Cleckheaton’s four-wicket win yesterday in the JCT600 Bradford League.

“It was a very poor wicket and it will be in my report to the league,” he said.

“To play in the First Division, or anywhere in the Bradford League on a wicket like that, is disgraceful and it is about time people started getting points docked for poor wickets. The ball was going through the top even in the first innings.

“I wouldn’t have liked to have batted first on it. Woodlands won the toss and batted, but we were going to bowl first anyway if we had won the toss.

“We thought it was going to get worse, but it got better as the game went on. The ball turned and we landed it in good areas.”

Woodlands, who went into the match in third place, were bowled out for a disappointing 147.

Significantly, Cleckheaton’s three spinners exploited what looked like a badly-worn pitch, with off-spinner Ammar Mahmood, their new overseas player, producing the admirable figures of five for 24 in 10.2 accurate overs.

He was well supported by young off-spinner Edward Walmsley and slow left-armer Mark Cummins, who each took two wickets.

Batting was always a struggle for Woodlands. Dan Shuffe tried to hold the innings together with a patient 35 in 76 minutes as they limped along to 99 for six for with only 11 overs left.

Big-hitting Sarfraz Ahmed then struck three sixes in the biggest stand – 38 with young wicket-keeper Usman Salim (29 not out) – but he was brilliantly caught on the boundary edge by Mahmood attempting a fourth six and Woodlands didn’t even manage a second batting point as their last two batsmen, Richard Spittlehouse and John Hill, fell to Mahmood in successive balls.

Just how much the pitch favoured the spinners was shown when Woodlands’ left-armer Chris Brice joined the attack.

He had Marcus Walmsley caught by Shuffe at slip in his first over with a ball that turned and lifted, and there was a repeat performance in the next over when he dismissed Ian Nicholson.

Unfortunately for Woodlands, they only had one spinner and, although Brice took all six wickets to fall in two fine spells, it wasn’t enough to prevent Cleckheaton from winning.

Mahmood and Cummins laid the foundations with a fourth wicket stand of 52 and, although there was a glimmer of hope for Woodlands when the visitors lost three wickets for 12 runs, including Mahmood for 53 when he danced down the pitch to Brice and was stumped, Edward Walmsley and Neil Nicholson saw them home with an unbroken seventh-wicket stand of 23.

Wood said: “The fact that Woodlands had only one spinner was the difference. We were able to work with three accurate spinners, and the two off-spinners turned the ball a lot.”

Woodlands skipper Pieter Swanepoel said: “It was very disappointing. We were missing injured Scott Richardson and Nicky Rushworth on holiday, so we were light on batting, but we don’t have any consistency.”