GOATACRE will travel to either Berkshire side Wraysbury or Cornwall outfit Roche Old Boys on July 26 after defeating local rivals Marshfield to progress to the last eight of the National Village Cup.

Ed Wilkins’ villagers emerged from their high-pressure last 16 local derby at Goatacre lane with a seven-wicket victory under their belts, Rob Murphy (3-25) leading the bowling as James Williams’ visitors were skittled for 150 at the end of a reduced 40 overs, Dave Jenkins top-scoring with 44.

Jack Haines (65) and Jif Wilkins (37*) then drove Goatacre to 151-3 early in the 28th over and with an appearance at Lord’s just two games away, their skipper is keen to keep his troops as grounded as possible.

“We’re into the last eight now. Some players in our team have never got this far before whilst there are some people, like Kev Iles, who have been there and done it,” said captain Wilkins.

“People are going to start to get excited but we’ve got to keep level-headed and just concentrate on every game as it comes.

“Commiserations to Marshfield because they’re a good side and I’m sure they’ll go on to do well in the competition in the future.

“I get on with their captain, James Williams, well and they’d beaten us the last two times we’d played each other, so it was nice to get one over on them.

“They got off to a pretty good start and were 90-2 at drinks but after that, we bowled very well and managed to take a few wickets.

“Rob Murphy took a few important ones and Kev Iles did the same – we were really happy to restrict them to 150.

“On our ground, we were confident of chasing that down and Jack Haines was the one behind it. His 65 was one of the best I’ve seen him put away and Rob and Jif Wilkins played a big part too.

“We’ve got to wait and see who we’ll be playing. If their game wasn’t down in Cornwall this weekend, maybe we’d have gone down to watch but you can’t ask the lads to travel there on Sunday, especially if Roche win and they have to go there again.”

Marshfield ply their trade two levels lower than their conquerors in the Wiltshire Division and skipper Williams reckons that his young troops’ cup ambitions will have only been tempered by their run to the national rounds of the Village Cup.

Williams said: “We had a lot of 16, 17 and 18-year-olds in the team and the next three or four years are massive for us because those youngsters will have gained a lot of experiences from this.

“We were more than a match for Goatacre but they just had quality in the right areas and our players know the benchmark they have to achieve. They’ve got players that have gone all the way in the last few years.

“A lot of the players were quite sombre in the dressing room because they really thought we were going to Lord’s.

"We want to go far in the competition again.”