By CONRAD SUTCLIFFE & PAUL BOLTON

SAM Elstone compiled a patient century to give Devon the edge going into day two of the Cluberly Championship play-off against Buckinghamshire.

Bucks were 60 for two 23 overs into their 90-over first-innings allocation with a 230-run deficit between them and Devon’s all out total of 290.

Sandy Allen, the Devon coach, said: “It was a positive day all round. We would have taken 290 at the start, however I feel we left a few runs out there.

“Sam batted brilliantly and fully deserved his hundred.

“Getting Bucks two down is a good start, but there is a lot of cricket left to be played.”

Elstone opened up for Devon on the West Bromwich Dartmouth ground at Sandwell and top scored with 104.

Along the way to his second Championship ton – his first was against Oxfordshire in 2024 – Elstone was involved in stands that took Devon from nought to 164 for four. Best of the stands was one of 70 for the fourth wicket with Matt Thompson (34).

The end for Elstone came when he tried to work the ball off his hips and skied it back to grateful bowler Archie Dodds. He had thwarted Buckinghamshire for 51 overs and reached his century from 144 balls with 13 fours 

Thompson, another conscientious compiler of runs, went on to make 34. He was wicket number two of five for Bucks spinner and captain Conner Haddow.

Devon lost three for 20 during a lull in run-getting that slowed them to 220 for seven.

Among the casualties was up-and-at-‘em batter Ben Privett, whose 21 included depositing Matt Pardoe for six on to the 18th green of the adjoining golf course! 

Thompson was caught at short-leg reverse sweeping Haddow, and James Matravers was stumped off Haddow.

Sam Read (38) and Callum Harvey (27) got back to the business of extending the total by adding 56 useful runs for the eighth wicket.

Pardoe’s left-arm spin accounted for Harvey, who found long-off not the short Birmingham Road boundary, and Read (38) paddled the same bowler to short fine-leg.

Last man George Daldorph did not last long, caught at slip, to give Haddow his fifth wicket of the innings and continue his remarkable record at the ground.

Slow left-armer Haddow bowled all but seven overs from the golf course end of the ground and took five for 103 from his marathon spell of 34.4 overs. That took Haddow’s aggregate to 38 wickets in seven innings for Buckinghamshire at Sandwell Park including five hauls of five wickets or more.

Buckinghamshire lost Archie Dodds, caught at second slip for a duck off Daldorph, in the third over of their reply before Billy Dodds and Aaryan Sawant settled things down with a second wicket partnership of 49.

Middlesex and former England under-19s batter Sawant had an escape when Matravers fumbled on the deep mid-wicket boundary rope off Harvey. There was no reprieve for Dodds when he was caught behind cutting the slow left-armer on 27 just before the close.

Sawant ended the day unbeaten on 32 with Buckinghamshire 60 for two.