Barkisland get off the mark

They lifted themselves off the foot of the Drakes Premiership with a three-wicket win sealed by Ben Westbrook’s boundary with seven balls remaining.

Alex Scholefield (4-46) helped limit Scholes to 203 for nine, a score Robinson felt was 50 below par on a good wicket.

Alex Kaye (29) and Jamie Summerscales (25) put on 60 for the first wicket before both departed. Luke Bridges (71) and Jake Finch (31) then led the chase.

Around 50 were needed off the last five overs but Bridges took 20-plus off one over to set up victory.

“We definitely needed that victory,” said Robinson.

In the Jedi Championship, Elland slipped to an 18-run defeat at Kirkheaton with Tom Gledhill a thorn in their side, hitting 126 not out in the hosts’ 256 for six.

Elland’s reply of 238 all out included 68 from overseas player Mitchell O’Brien.

Rastrick’s hopes of a promotion challenge were hit by a comprehensive eight-wicket defeat at Almondbury Wesleyans, where they only totalled 156.

Numbers four and five, Javed Faisal (49) and Joe Vickers (53), were the only batsmen from the Round Hill club to top the extras tally of 11.

Todmorden go into today’s home Worsley Cup first round match against competition debutants Great Harwood as joint leaders of the Lancashire League.

Andrew Sutcliffe’s side made it three wins on the trot, after an opening day washout, with an impressive eight-wicket win away to champions Ramsbottom yesterday.

What will particularly please Sutcliffe is that it wasn’t mainly down to Kelly Smuts, although the South African inevitably had a part to play in sealing success.

The Centre Vale’s unheralded bowling attack dismissed the Acre Bottom outfit for 135 after initially being put on the back foot by an opening stand of 72 between Tom Parton (67) and Fraser Kay (30).

Hamza Ali (3-20), Sutcliffe (2-12), Matt Collins (2-34) and Smuts (2-38) all chipped in with wickets and Kristian Garland had four victims behind the stumps.

Openers Ben Pearson (24) and Sutcliffe (19) put on 55 before both were dismissed by Jon Fielding (2-32).

Smuts continued his superb start with the bat by making an unbeaten 47 from 52 balls, putting on 58 with Ben Sutcliffe (24 not out) to clinch victory.

Tod moved on to 37 points and are level with Lowerhouse and East Lancs.

Lightcliffe’s bowling attack was made to look lightweight by a powerful Hanging Heaton batting line-up in the Premier Division of the Bradford League.

Heaton won by 94 runs after rattling up 331 for four with their top three batsmen Gary Fellows (74), Nick Connolly (112) and Richard Foster (88) all scoring heavily before David Stiff crashed 31 not out off 14 balls at the end.

It was then the turn of the Lightcliffe batsmen to look secure on a good wicket. All the top six got a start, headed by skipper Matt Baxter (46), but the visitors were unable to score quickly enough and finished on 237 for seven.

In Championship 2, Northowram lost by one wicket at home to a Hartshead Moor side who had also taken an unbeaten record into the game.

The Rams looked out of it when they posted only 132. Player-coach AJ Weerapuuli was out to the first ball of the innings and skipper Jon Lister (31), Chris Metcalf (27), Majid Jahangir (19) and last man Josh Bennett-Kear (13) were the only players to make double figures as ex-Yorkshire and Scotland pace man Iain Wardlaw took four for 42.

Moor were looking secure at 95 for three but wickets tumbled and their last pair had to make 11 to seal victory, a six from number 11 Rauf Qayyum helping in a tense finish.

Ex-Sowerby Bridge bowler Ashton Richardson impressed with four for 37.

Brighouse were on the back foot from the start away to Liversedge and lost by 133 runs.

Home openers Alan Sumner (102) and Mark Hydes (42) took the game to them and although skipper Sunny Matharu took four wickets, Asif Ali (71) and Paul Marlow (44) helped Liversedge to 293 for six.

Brighouse were best served by middle-order pair Sohail Hussain (40) and Samar Farooq (39) when they replied but were all out for 160 and are still looking for a first win of the season.