On day 5 of the SWCGA Championship Cornwall slid to a further defeat losing 8.25 - 5.75 to a Wiltshire side who as a team outplayed the Duchy side, albeit there were many positives for Cornwall.

On a dry sunny warm but very windy day, the morning singles saw Joe Cruse out first against Garry Slade and it was the latter who came out on top winning 5&3. This was not the first game to finish though as Matt Richards recorded the biggest victory margin in the entire matchplay stages with a 9&7 drubbing of James Cooper. Ryan Curtis at No.3 was beaten 3&1 by Tom Law but again the balance was restored as Richard Jasper beat Jamie Amor 2&1. By now Aaron Stephens had gone down 6&5 to Dominic Baverstock-Seaman but yet again Cornwall kept in the match with Josh Greenaway wiining 3&2 over Jack Seaman. Rob MacGregor playing at No.8 came up against an inspired opponent in Jake Bolton who was 7 under at the point he won the match 5&4. There was still a chance for Cornwall with Conor Wilson coming down the last all square. When he and his opponent halved the morning score was 4.5 - 3.5 in favour of Wiltshire.

There followed an afternoon of mixed fortunes and outcomes. Out first Joe Cruse and Matt Richards gained an unlikely half on the last hole of a seesaw match with never more than one hole in it. At 1 down Richards holed an excellent putt on the 17th to take the match to 18. Both teams hit poor tee shots but the luck was with the Duchy who found their ball in deep rough. Wiltshire were not so fortunate and had to return to the tee. The Cornish pair found the 18th in 3 and that was good enough to gain them a half.

By this time Richard Jasper and Josh Greenaway had won their match 5&4 against Jack Seaman & Jake Bolton and played solid foursomes golf throughout. Shortly after Jared Mortimore and Aaron Stephens went down 2&1 to Tom Law and Max Drayton and having been down to a greater extent during the match did well to get to that point.

The back match was now vital to Cornish hopes but this was not to be as Conor Wilson & Rob MacGregor despite getting to the 18th eventually succumbed 2 down to Amor & Baverstock-Seaman.

Also on Thursday Devon were beaten by Somerset and Dorset came from 6-2 down at lunch to win three afternoon foursomes and halve one and in so doing recorded a surprising 7.25 - 6.75 victory.

Friday sees the final day of action as Cornwall take on the undefeated Somerset team commencing at 8.45am.

Day 5 scores