ASHWELL returned to league action this week with a victory by 46 runs at Haslingfield, to keep up the pressure at the top of Cambridgeshire Division 2SA. Batting first, Ashwell s openers Pete Davis & Martyn Deal got off to their customary solid start, sh

ASHWELL returned to league action this week with a victory by 46 runs at Haslingfield, to keep up the pressure at the top of Cambridgeshire Division 2SA.

Batting first, Ashwell's openers Pete Davis & Martyn Deal got off to their customary solid start, sharing a stand of 112 for the first wicket.

Once Davis (60) and Deal (53) had been dismissed, Richard Young's innings of 26 helped guide Ashwell's middle order to a challenging total of 191-5 from their 40 overs.

The Haslingfield response got off to a shaky start as Philip Graves (3-22) and Russell Kemp (2-17) cut through the top order.

A recovery, led by Shinn (34) and Dickens (53) briefly rallied Haslingfield, but an excellent spell of slow left arm bowling from Jon Simons (10-4-25-3) ensured that the shackles were never broken - Haslingfield ending up 46 runs short at 145 all out in the penultimate over.

The result keeps Ashwell in the thick of a three way battle for promotion at the top of the division, with third placed NCI the visitors on Saturday.

A second successive defeat at bogey ground Yelling has left Thriplow needing a morale boosting victory at local rivals Newton on Saturday to get their title challenge back on track.

On a hot afternoon Thriplow won the toss and batted but Dickon Turner and Martin Craze were pinned down by tight spells from Steve Tack and Aaron Johnson.

Eventually Turner felt that 29 off 14 overs was just not good enough but could only sky an attempted slash to mid off.

The wicket had seemed inconsistent from the start but Craze then played forward to a good length ball from Walker only for it to leap and crunch into his nose.

He left the field bloodied but unbowed and was replaced by Paul Staley who was equally done by the bounce when one from Reed shot along the floor to bowl him.

After this the Thriplow batsmen were understandably cautious but this manifested itself in a desire to play shots to anything that was not straight.

Unfortunately this simply resulted in a rash of catches as Smith (13), Ayre (11), Viner (4) and Andy Craze (17) all perished.

Andy Morris hit a more considered 19 but when Neild was caught at fine leg by R Smith after an unnecessary bout of juggling.

A sharp thunderstorm made no difference and there was just time for Jan Arriens to smash a boundary down the ground to secure the third bonus point as Thriplow subsided for a meek 123.

The rain persisted for a while but all this seemed to do was take all the sting out of the track as the Thriplow attack seemed mild by comparison.

Eventually Reed (28) picked out Andy Morris at mid off to give Turner his only wicket but at 69 this was not enough for the visitors.

Ayre picked up a couple of late scalps including Topham for 55 and Andy Morris's leg spin was given its first airing in a Thriplow shirt with reasonable success - Arriens snapping up a sharp stumping to dismiss Smith.

However it was too little, too late, for Thriplow as Yelling coasted home with six wickets to spare and throw the CCA Senior League Two title race wide open.