WILTSHIRE’S season came to a miserable conclusion as they were beaten inside two days by new champions Oxfordshire.

Michael Coles’ men produced nothing like their best cricket at Devizes and were thrashed by an innings and 183 runs.

Wiltshire had high hopes for the season having claimed the Western Division title last summer but they have now had to surrender that crown to Oxfordshire, who clinched the title with victory.

The home side simply never got going in the contest and were skittled for just 92 on the opening day of the game as Chad Keegan decimated the batting order with a haul of 5-35.

Oxfordshire showed their hosts how it should be done when it was their turn to bat and racked up a mammoth score of 359 by the time they were dismissed.

Opener Hugo Darby was the backbone of the innings with a fine knock of 112, while there were three wickets a piece for Wiltshire duo Tahir Afridi and Joe King.

Needing to score 267 just to make the visitors bat again, Wiltshire surrendered meekly in the second innings as they collapsed to 84 all out, 43 of which came from Ed Young.

Harvey Eltham did the damage with the ball this time, taking 4-13 as Oxfordshire wrapped up the win before tea on the second day.

Wiltshire all-rounder Ashur Morrison said: “They just played the better cricket over the day-and-a-half. It’s as simple as that.

“We played poorly on the first day and we didn’t set them a big enough target and we were always on the back foot from there.

“In their first innings, they showed us how to bat on what was actually a pretty good wicket and then when we came to bat again, we didn’t show enough hunger or fight to try to get anything out of the game.”

Although it was always going to be a big ask for Wiltshire to defend their title, Morrison conceded that Wiltshire should have made a better fist of it than they did.

Neil Shardlow’s side claimed just two wins from the five matches they played over the summer and had to settle for a seventh-placed finish in the table.

“It’s disappointing as Colesy (captain Mike Coles) and Shards have set the targets quite high on the back of our championship year last year but we haven’t quite been able to reach those,” said Morrison.

“It’s always going to be hard for any team to win two championships back-to-back but with the quality of players we have got in our squad, we thought we could have a real go at it.

“We have just not been consistent enough over the summer. I don’t think there’s been a time this season when we have won a full day’s cricket. Maybe two sessions in a row but we just haven’t been able to do it for a full day.

“It’s disappointing but we’ll try to learn from the games we’ve played this year, move on and come back stronger next season.”