FOUR wickets from Jake Price and an unbeaten 50 from in-form Tom Underhill guided Astwood Bank to a comfortable and vital seven-wicket victory at Newport on Saturday to maintain their Birmingham League Division Three promotion charge.
The 24 points gained by Steve Adshead’s third placed side proved vital on a day in which promotion rivals Fordhouses, Pershore and Streetly all secured victory.
Bank, who remain 12 points behind second placed Pershore, will now target a third victory in succession when they host Aston Manor on Saturday.
The Shropshire side won the toss and chose to bat on Saturday but, other than opener Ian Gillespie (48) who was one of three wickets for Tom Harris (3-35), they never got to grips with the visitors’ bowling attack.
Mike Desmond continued his impressive season with 2-32 from 11 overs before Price (4-20) rattled through the lower order as Newport were dismissed for 148 in the 48th over.
Opener Tom Pedley made 41 for Bank but when he was dismissed the score was 75-3 and Adshead’s side still had work to do.
However, Underhill followed his unbeaten century of the previous weekend’s victory over Eastnor with an unbeaten 50 and received good support from Sam Thomas (26no) as the visitors reached 149-3 in the 32nd over.
