Derbyshire opened their Metro Bank One-Day Cup campaign with defeat in a high-scoring game at Cheltenham College.
Ollie Price scored a hundred as Gloucestershire beat Derbyshire Falcons by 59 runs on the opening round of 50-over cricket in 2025.
The Oxford-born batter posted 103 from 115 balls and staged stands of 141 with James Bracey and 97 with Ben Charlesworth for the second and third wickets respectively as the home side ran up an imposing 341-8 at the famous College Ground. Promoted to open the innings, Bracey contributed an enterprising 83, while Charlesworth and skipper Jack Taylor weighed in with half centuries.
Brooke Guest raised a brilliant 86 from 88 balls and shared stands of 64 with Matt Montgomery and 76 with Amrit Basra, who scored 42 and 40 respectively, as the Falcons made a decent fist of chasing. But pacer Zaman Akhter returned figures of 4-47, including a decisive spell of three wickets in six balls, to swing the contest back in Gloucestershire’s favour and ensure Derbyshire were dismissed for 282 in 45.5 overs.
Derbyshire won the toss, elected to field and saw debutant Rory Haydon remove Australian Test batsman Cameron Bancroft lbw in a tidy new-ball spell of 1-16 from six overs with one maiden. Driving and cutting fluently, Bracey and Price found runs easier to come by against Ben Aitchison from the Chapel End. When Nick Potts replaced Aitchison, Bracey hoisted him high over mid-wicket for six to bring up the half century stand, twice repeating the feat with further effortless pick-ups a few overs later to afford the innings added impetus.
Bracey went to 50 via 40 balls with 4 fours and 3 sixes and then smashed Potts for another six over mid-wicket as the innings assumed three figures. Potts was withdrawn after conceding 42 from three overs, but there was no reduction in the rate of scoring from the Chapel End, Price reverse sweeping Montgomery’s off spin for four to raise the hundred partnership in just 15 overs. He brought up his 50 via 59 balls soon afterwards.
Derbyshire desperately required a breakthrough and Montgomery obliged, bowling Bracey via an inside edge with the score 148-2 in the 23rd. Bracey had dominated a stand of 141, his aggressive knock spanning 66 balls, including 8 fours and 4 sixes and affording his side an excellent platform. Price and Charlesworth consolidated thereafter, adding 50 for the third wicket in 63 balls in the face of accurate bowling from Joe Hawkins and Basra.
A bumper Festival audience rose to acknowledge Price’s fourth List-A hundred, the 24-year-old reaching the landmark in 111 balls with a swept single behind square off Montgomery. Having hit 10 fours and a six, he was then bowled by Andersson. But there was no respite for the visitors, Charlesworth moving seamlessly to a run-a-ball half century with 4 fours and a six.
Aitchison had Charlesworth held at long-on for a 59-ball 60 and Graeme van Buuren caught at the wicket for eight as Derbyshire briefly applied the brakes, only for the experienced Jack Taylor to combine power and deft placement in raising a quickfire 67 from 37 balls with 10 fours and a six to carry Gloucestershire out of sight.
Forced to score briskly from the outset, Derbyshire lost Harry Came to scoreboard pressure in the seventh, the opener driving a length ball from Matt Taylor straight to mid-on with 24 on the board. But Caleb Jewell and Montgomery made amends, finding the boundary with sufficient regularity to advance the score to 53 at the end of 10 overs.
Returning to Gloucestershire on loan seven years after leaving to join Warwickshire, Craig Miles struck an important blow when persuading Australian Jewell to cut to Charlesworth at backward point for 35 with the score 61-2. But the visitors continued to make a fight of it, Montgomery and Guest bringing up 100 inside 18 overs to keep the required rate at around 7.5 an over. The 50 partnership occupied 55 balls, the third wicket pair establishing themselves in a manner which suggested Gloucestershire might not have things all their own way.
Having accrued a six and 5 fours in raising a 39-ball 42, Montgomery blotted his copybook, playing back to van Buuren’s slow left arm and chopping on to terminate a partnership of 64 in 11.3 overs as Falcons slipped to 125-3. Akhter and van Buuren applied the squeeze during the middle overs and Jack Taylor benefited, having Martin Andersson held at extra cover with the score 152-4.
Derbyshire were still in with a chance while Guest remained at large, the captain going to 50 from 61 balls, while debutant Basra demonstrated clever improvisation to hit the ground running, plundering sixes at the expense of Jack Taylor, Josh Shaw and Miles to keep the reply on track.
Gloucestershire needed a wicket and Akhter responded by taking three in the space of six balls. He bowled the combative Basra for a 31-ball 40, had Guest held at long-on in his next over and then removed Ross Whiteley cheaply to reduce the Falcons to 234-7 and relieve pressure on his team. Requiring a further 107 from 11.1 overs, Derbyshire were never really in the hunt thereafter, Aitchison succumbing to Matt Taylor for 19 as the chase ran out of steam.
Derbyshire captain Brooke Guest said: “It’s not the result we wanted, but I’m pleased with what is quite a young group. We were competitive for quite a long time in the game and there were plenty of positives to take from the day. Rory Haydon bowled a really good spell with the new ball, took the key wicket of Cameron Bancroft and put in the kind of performance we are coming to expect from him.
“Unfortunately for us, it’s a tough ground to bowl on and Gloucestershire got a good partnership going between James Bracey and Ollie Price. They played really nice, made us of the short boundary and quick outfield and took the game away from us a little bit. We still felt we were in with a chance at the halfway stage and we spoke of the importance of building partnerships.
“I was able to play myself in and had a couple of good partnerships with Matt Montgomery and Amrit Basra, at which point we were well in the game. But Zaman Akhter bowled well and losing three or four wickets in quick succession proved the difference in the end.”
One-Day Cricket returns this August!
The Metro Bank One-Day Cup returns for the school holidays, with four huge Falcons home games coming up.
From a local derby against Notts Outlaws, to the Tap Takeover for the visit of Surrey, plus the return to Repton School to face Worcestershire Rapids and our Community Fixture against Essex, there’s so much action to enjoy this August!
