NETHERFIELD captain Marc Brown excelled with the bat to help his team bring the Cumbria Cup back to Parkside Road for the first time since 2008 with a 27 run win over Cleator.

After weather halted proceedings at Barrow two weeks ago, Brown's men were put into bat by Cleator on Sunday and were struggling on 21-3 before a 97 partnership between the skipper and Tom Williamson saw them ease to a total of 182-7.

The West Cumbrian outfit dug deep but were well contained by Netherfield's bowlers and it was all she wrote when pro Dieter Klein dismissed final batsman David Bell with just 155 on the scoreboard.

"It was a terrific effort against a good team," said Brown. "My roots are from their league and I do know a lot of the teams but it's difficult at times to judge teams when you don't play them often.

"We performed very well with the ball. With the bat we stuttered a bit at the start but it turned out to be a fantastic day for the club and one that we can be really proud of with a young side."

Brown's 93 was the highlight of the first innings and helped to dig his team out of a tricky hole before he was caught by a stunning Darren Clark catch off the bowling of Liam Mattinson.

"Getting a century was irrelevant because we won," said Brown. "I was out to probably the best catch I've been out to all season so it could have been different. I might have got another seven runs and piled on another 20 in the last couple of overs but from the position we were in I was happy with the score.

"We have had a bit of a disappointing league campaign but I look at our team picture and see only two players over the age of 26 so we know we aren't going to be consistent because players have not had that bank of seasons behind them. It takes a while mentally to get to a stage to fully appreciate what the game is about."

On Saturday, Field lost a high scoring encounter with Darwen by 32 runs.

Contributions of David Bowden (55) and Mark Friend (58), combined with John Cordingley's top score of 92 unbeaten, gave Darwen the platform for the win as they finished on 256-7

Rick Potters' century knock of 131 was the main stay of Netherfield's reply however no other batsman could stay with him, as Bowden returned figures of 6-41 to put an end to Netherfield's revival on 224.

Netherfield host Preston in the last game of the season on Saturday.