SHOULD Calmore be relegated at the end of the season they might look back at this fixture and lament their negative attitude.

The strugglers have suffered a series of heavy reverses in previous weeks, but with South Wilts' off-colour performance on Saturday, they put themselves into a match-winning position but showed neither the will or the inclination to take the much-needed victory.

They now lie 20 points adrift at the foot of the table, but this deficit could have been virtually wiped out had they shown a little ambition.

The Salisbury side have been out of sorts since injury disrupted their fine early season form and this showed no signs of changing. They have now gone five games without a victory.

On a decent if imperfect surface, all the South Wilts batsmen made good starts, but then most perished to rash shots with concentration a problem.

Tom Caines, 36, Paul Draper, 34, and Jason Laney, 31, were just three of the seven batsmen who got to double figures in untroubled fashion.

Charlie Freeston, 3-69, bowled a long effective spell for Calmore and although Mark Boston picked up four wickets, it was the South Wilts batsmen who shoulder responsibility for getting themselves out.

A late middle order collapse left them in deep trouble at 183-9, but Jimmy Seeary, battling at number 11, showed the higher order batsmen how to mix caution with controlled aggression as he hit 32 not out to take South Wilts to 225-9.

Calmore looked to have the game sewn up as they eased to 125-2, but with 100 required off 23 overs and seven wickets in hand against a dispirited South Wilts side, Calmore astonishingly played for a draw.

Injured South Wilts skipper Rob Wade watched in amazement: "They had the game by the scruff of the neck and just didn't want it.

"They were obsessed with getting the three bonus points for a winning draw, but they didn't realise that because they had won the toss and asked us to bat, they couldn't get a winning draw."

As a result South Wilts lost any chance they had of winning, with the Calmore batsmen shutting up shop.

James Hayward, making his first team debut, and Draper worked hard for the breakthrough but it did not come and the final scoreline had an unreal look to it as Calmore finished just 29 runs short without going for the runs.

On Saturday, eighth-placed Portsmouth visit Salisbury, now in sixth place.

After their thrilling win last week, a buoyant South Wilts II team were firmly put back in their place by a confident table-topping Alton.

The visitors got off to a flier and although at one time South Wilts clawed them back to 180-7 thanks to Eddie Abel with 2-40 off 12 overs and Lysander Wolf, 4-38, Alton eased to an unassailable 257-8.

South Wilts got to 60 in reply through Williams and Abel, but in the chase for quick runs suffered a collapsed and finished on 135 all out.

There was better news for the third team who confirmed their top of the table status with a convincing win over Compton & Chandlers Ford.Batting first, they put up a challenging 216-8 thanks to Patel, 44, and Sadler, 29.

The visitors never looked like winning and were all out for 170 with Gary Button, 3-35, and Matt Newman, 5-49, sharing the honours.

A weakened fourth team were crushed as Compton reached their low target in just 25 overs.

Andy Jackson, 61, performed well, but with little support, their score of 120 was never likely to be sufficient.