Beacon ready for Milford Hall shoot-out

Tonks led his side to a three-wicket win at home over

at the weekend, to keep them in second and just six points behind leaders Milford.

Beacon bowled first and had Swindon all out for 128 after 41.4 overs and despite an onslaught from Abid Khan, who claimed four wickets, they managed to chase down the target.

Tonks said: "We did make slightly hard work of it, but Abid bowled extremely well.

"I'm chuffed with the lads, you can't ask for much more but we are just up against another exceptional team for the title in Milford Hall.

"In any other season, ours and Milford's points total would probably be enough to put you 30-40 points clear.

"We can't really do anything else. All we can do is try and win every game we have but it's probably going to go down to the Milford game."

Milford remained top of the pile with an emphatic victory over Aldridge.

Chris Becker and Haydn Slodecki both got centuries – 134 runs and 112 runs respectively – to put Milford on course for a 320-3 finish.

They proved to be just as ruthless with the ball with Qamar Abbas getting two wickets and Ejaz Nawaz a phenomenal eight, as Aldridge were all out for just 62 after 20 overs.

Third-placed Cannock, who are very much still in the title race, won comfortably at home against Whittington.

South African Brian Barnard was in fine form again, bludgeoning 94 runs to help Cannock to a total of 258.

Matt Robinson claimed four wickets, as Whittington fell 177 runs short in their reply.

Skipper Will Fleet has laid out a simple message to his team-mates.

He said: "The main thing we have got to do is keep up putting out good performances and getting results so we are there if the other two slip up."

At the other end, rock-bottom Bloxwich lost by 238 runs against Pelsall.

Wednesbury, one place above, fell way short of Hammerwich's total and third-bottom Walsall YPF were defeated by seven wickets by Penn.

This weekend, Milford Hall play Wednesbury, Beacon go to Penn and Cannock are at Swindon.