A fantastic team performance saw the Village 1st XI take all 30 points against Old Owens 2nd XI on a blazing hot day at Burtonhole Lane. The conditions were ideal for batting, so it was a good toss for captain Devraj Ray to win.

Sumit Jadav got the side off to a racing start with seven glorious boundaries, taking the score to 49 before the first wicket fell. A captain's anchoring role was the order of the day as Ray dug in for 30-odd overs for 32, which allowed the likes of Marcus Cara, Sam Smith and then Will Wyatt to play freely - all made solid contributions with scores of 22, 36 and 39 respectively.

Match scorecard

A defiant wag of the tail from Tommy Smith (including an absolute monster of a cover drive six) and Obaid Ur Rehman helped take the score up to 243 - a vastly improved batting performance giving the side a real boost.

Sam Smith was able to remove the opening batsmen for Owens, before a spell of disciplined bowling from Marcus Cara produced four wickets to dismantle the middle order, allowing spinners Obaid Ur Rehman and Amit Chadha to come in and clean up the tail, with Old Owens still 105 runs short.

Division 5A table

Captain Devraj Ray said: "Despite a couple of hiccups in the fielding department, which we will address, this was by some distance our most professional performance of the season. We've had some silly slip-ups, and we're at a point in this season where we can't afford any more. We took on that pressure in a must-win game and won by more than 100 runs.

"If we play like this for the remaining three games, we'll be well and truly in the mix for promotion. I'm so proud of us today."