Winning start for Harriers

3:06pm Wednesday 7th May 2008

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CAMBRIDGE Harriers' senior men's team started this year's campaign to join the athletic elite by beating last year's unbeaten champions Exeter at Eltham on Saturday.

With the additional presence of a strong Portsmouth team, this win was hard earned rather than the result of any dominance as Cambridge maintained a very slender lead until the later stages.

There was little doubt about who was the star of the show as Francois Potgieter won both the 110m and 400m hurdle events, along with the high jump and pole vault.

To this he then added a fine long jump of 6.54m which, on this occasion, only merited third place in the quality field present.

The Harriers' only other A string wins were to come from Dean Lacy in the 1,500m 4m01.5s and Prince Ezenwa in the triple jump, where a fine leap of 14.63m took the spoils.

Both athletes added further points though with Lacy third in the 800m, while Ezenwa won the long jump B string.

Other B string victories came on the track from Lee Coogan (800m), Dave Reader (1,500m), Matt Winn-Smith (5,000m) and from Liam Corcoran in the steeplechase.

It was in the latter event in which the debut of the day occurred as youngster Sam Murphy just failed to catch the winner with a time of 10m32.7s.

Another under-17 Harrier stood out in the field as Kevin Kwarteng enjoyed B string wins in the high jump and triple jump, while in the throws there were victories for veterans Tony Tipping (discus) and Chris Melluish (hammer).

As the day drew to a close, Cambridge nudged further ahead in what on paper looked to be one of their most difficult matches of the season.

A number of athletes congregated at the end to hear confirmation of the result after what had been tough afternoon.

Result: First - Cambridge Harriers 135; Second - Portsmouth 126; Third - Exeter 117; Fourth - Newbury - 74; Fifth - Newham - 69.