SATURDAY’S play in the Ashton and Oldham Cricket Alliance saw Jay Hind lose further ground on leaders Star Eleven.

The pacesetters reached 297-7 against St Mary’s HC, Rizwan and Imran both with 80, before St Mary’s reached 115-9 at the close thanks to Lawrence’s 41.

Having seen Friends reach 158, Jay Hind were reduced to 53-6 before recovering to post 140-6 thanks to an unbeaten stand between Viral (69) and Suresh (22).

AJK recorded a convincing victory against Foresters, Jasim hitting 178 in their 293-4 before Asad took 3-3 as AJK were all out for 44.

Radclyffe gained their first point of the season with a surprise outright win at Europa Exiles where the hosts were skittled for 66, Wright with 5-16 and Brown 3-13 for Radclyffe who replied with 67-6.

Waterhead Methodist had their opening victory of the campaign against Newtonhurst by reaching 113-6 chasing their visitors’ 112-9.

An excellent match at Copthorne saw the hosts total 175-9, Abbas with 67, only for Shenton’s unbeaten 105 to guide Greengate home with seven wickets in hand.

Sunday saw the Advertiser-sponsored six-a-side competition for the Peter Tobin Shield at Ashton Cricket Club.

Ten teams were in action, four of them in the preliminary round where Star Eleven’s total of 80 was seven too many for Europa Exiles, while Friends reached 95 against Copthorne who could only make 65 in reply.

As for the second round matches, there were wins for Star Eleven, AJK, Friends and Newtonhurst against Greengate, Jay Hind, Waterhead Methodist and St Mary’s HC respectively.

The semi-final brought a 17-run victory for Star Eleven against AJK and a 39-run win for Friends over Newtonhurst.

The final saw Star Eleven bat first and reach 69, only for Friends to secure victory in the final over and retain their crown in the process.

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