STOKE Gabriel had a double dose of Cullompton in league and cup over the weekend – and came off second best both times.

Stoke skipper Jake Robinson had hoped to gain ground on leaders Cullompton in the B Division promotion race when the two sides met on the Eastley Memorial Ground on Saturday afternoon.

Despite holding Cullompton to 200 for nine in their 45 overs, Stoke were bowled out for 147 in reply and lost by 53 runs.

Euan Tinley (52) and Brendon Parr (39) booked the best of a respectable set of scores for Cullompton, who recovered from being 98 for six to reach 200. There were two wickets each for Isaac Withington, Mike Smith and Justin Pringle.

Stoke were all out in reply for 147. Abhishek Anand made 73. No one else made more than 13

Cully shared the wicket-taking chores around. James Vincent had two up top, Dan Reynaldo had two in the middle and Dinesh Raheja (3-21) finished off the lower order.

Robinson said: “You cannot let teams go from 98 for six to 200 – and when we needed 120 to win it is not good enough to lose by 50 with the batting we had left.”

Stoke (201pts) are still third in the table, but trail Cullompton (223) and second-placed Barton (221) with time running out to do something about the deficit. A Cullompton win over Barton this Saturday would do Stoke a favour.

There was a second bite of the Cullompton cherry on Sunday at Sandford, where Stoke were competing in the Ivor Dewdney-sponsored Corinthian Cup finals day.

Stoke (129-7) met holders Cullompton (131-3) in the second semi-final, which they lost by seven wickets.

Jack Tolley top scored on 43 for Stoke Gabriel, and Pringle made 35 before dobbing a return catch back to Deshan Dias, in a 20-over total of 129 for seven. Dias conjured up a T20 rarity – a maiden – during his four-over allocation.

Seamer Paul Rendall (4-25) was comfortably Cullompton’s most successful bowler.

Cullompton’s run chase was a perfunctory affair led by third-man in Akshay Bharadwaj, who bludgeoned 93 not out from 52 balls faced to clinch a spot in the final with more than four overs to spare.

Bharadwaj launched six sixes – mostly back over the bowler’s heads – and clattered eight fours to condemn Stoke to a fourth successive finals day defeat.

“I must say losing on finals day is getting a bit tiring, however I think we lost to the best team in the competition,” said Robinson.

“I was hoping we could get to 150, but even that would likely have been short in the end.”

Cullompton went on to hammer Teignmouth & Shaldon by eight-wickets in the final.

Stoke will hope to bounce back against Budleigh Salterton this Saturday on their first visit to the Holt.