Sabin and West excel as Banbury take maximum points at Slough

Banbury beat Slough by eight wickets in Saturday’s division one fixture with Sabin finally finding his form with the bat and West doing the damage with the ball.

Having won the toss, Slough captain Goutham Shrikrishna elected to bat and saw his side make a decent start with Muaaz Ali Ahmed and Rahim Akhtar putting on 45 runs for the opening wicket.

Ahmed was run out by Joe Thomas for 34 runs and fellow opener Akhtar soon followed, caught by Ollie Clarke for the first of West’s four victims. Banbury picked up another couple of quick wickets, Saif Zaib made 22 runs when he was bowled by West who then trapped Harish Kakani lbw to reduce Slough to 82-4.

But Nabil Shah and Girinath Reddy Poreddy put on 72 runs for the fifth wicket to resurrect the innings. The partnership was broken when Shah was caught and bowled by Clarke for 32 runs and that signalled the fall of wickets in quick succession as Slough were dismissed for 167 runs in the final over with Poreddy top scoring on 49 while West picked up 4-39, Clarke 3-31 and Thomas 2-45.

In reply, Banbury lost Ed Phillips with 34 runs on the board when he was bowled by Zaib. But Sabin and Joe White put on 52 runs for the second wicket when the former Great & Little Tew batsman was caught and bowled by Rishi Sharath for 32 runs.

That left Sabin and Shahid Yousaf to see Banbury to victory in the 45th over. Sabin remained unbeaten on 74 runs from 137 balls which included 11 fours and a six while Yousaf made an unbeaten 45 runs from 40 balls which included four boundaries and a six.