MALVERN were left to rue missed opportunities as they slipped to a 91-run defeat in their opening match of the Worcestershire League Division Three season at The Ramblers.

After winning the toss and putting Himbleton in to bat Rob Perrins (5-50) made an early breakthrough removing opener Dickenson with the total on nine.

But Himbleton rebuilt steadily with the rest of the top order contributing and taking advantage of several dropped catches by the Malvern fielders.

The pick of the batsman was A Pretty top-scoring with 66 before being caught off the bowling of Perrins.

There were also wickets for Jeremy Pilgrim (3-66) making his Malvern debut and a wicket for Ollie Halion taking 1-8 in a tidy three over spell on his first team debut.

Despite the missed chances, Malvern were still in the game having managed to restrict Himbleton to 216 off 42 overs.

The Malvern innings got off to a good start with Anthony Arnold and Lewis Hill putting on 33 for the first wicket.

But disappointing run outs of opener Arnold (9) and number three batsmen Luke Halion (15) held Malvern in check.

The rest of the innings was characterised by batsmen either being dismissed cheaply or getting starts but not progressing with opener Hill (26) top scoring.

The Malvern innings closed on 125 when last man Chay Ankers was caught off the bowling of J Alford to give him figures of 6-22 from only 6.2 overs.

The loss will be a big disappointment to Malvern who were fielding a strong team.

But they will look to learn from this and turn their fortunes around for the next match away to Martley.

Meanwhile, Malvern’s second XI fared much better in their opener away to Himbleton as they recorded a morale boosting seven-wicket win.