Scrivens' century lifts Sunrisers to top spot

Sunrisers captain Grace Scrivens led from the front with an unbeaten century as her side beat Central Sparks by five wickets at Kidderminster to move top of the Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy table.

The England A international struck 118 not out from 123 balls – the highest individual score of the tournament so far – to secure Sunrisers’ third victory in four games.

Sparks struggled after Scrivens had put them in to bat, losing openers Evelyn Jones and Chloe Brewer to Kate Coppack (3-26) with just one run on the board and fellow seamer Nic Hancock weighed in with 3-34, although Abbey Freeborn led the home side’s fightback with 93.

That enabled Sparks to post a total of 213, but Scrivens’ stand of 110 with Cordelia Griffith (37) made a significant dent in the target and Amara Carr (26) helped her captain to clinch the win with 10.2 overs to spare.

Nancy Harman and Alice Monaghan kept their cool to get defending champions Southern Vipers over the line by three wickets in a hard-fought encounter with Thunder at Wormsley CC.

Thunder finished on 206-9, built around Seren Smale’s knock of 99 – the teenager narrowly missing out on her maiden hundred after sharing a partnership of 94 with Katie Mack (37), while Vipers’ left-arm spinner Linsey Smith took 3-19.

Captain Georgia Adams (51 from 65) and Georgia Elwiss (43 from 45) kept the home side on track, but both departed in quick succession and Vipers slumped to 167-7 before Harman (26*) and Monaghan (27*) clinched their third straight victory.

There was an even closer finish at Scarborough, where The Blaze – beaten finalists last season – finally registered their first win, squeezing home in a see-saw game against Northern Diamonds by two wickets.

Having slumped to 120-7, the Diamonds’ mini-recovery was led by Leah Dobson’s innings of 54 on her home ground as they hauled themselves to 188, but the visitors looked favourites when they reached 67-1 in the 20th over.

They were pegged back to 105-6 by Katie Levick’s miserly spell of 1-13 and Erin Burns’ 3-40, but Bethan Gammon (39) and Ella Claridge (26*) added 61 and, needing five from the final over, Lucy Higham (9*) scrambled home with two balls to spare.

Half-centuries from Sophie Luff and Fran Wilson were enough to earn Western Storm an unlikely eight-run (DLS) victory at Taunton and end South East Stars’ 100 per cent record in the tournament.

Stars posted a daunting total of 298-5 from 44 overs as Paige Scholfield (74 from 68) and Alice Davidson-Richards (65 from 85) put together a 100 partnership before Aylish Cranstone slammed an undefeated 63 from just 40 balls.

But despite losing openers Alex Griffiths and Sophia Smale cheaply, Storm made a good fist of the chase as captain Luff (59 from 73) and Wilson (65 from 61) built a strong platform before Nat Wraith (40* from 28) put them on the right side of the calculation when rain intervened at 236-5 from 36 overs.