All-round effort keeps Welsh Fire alive in playoffs race

A rounded bowling effort and the flexing of batting muscles by the top-three helped Welsh Fire to a comprehensive win that keeps them alive in the race for the playoffs in the Men's Hundred 2025. The win, coming at the cost of Birmingham Phoenix, puts both teams on eight points and with each team having two games left to play.

The road to the knockouts is still arduous for both sides - they need to win both the games to match third-placed Northern Superchargers, and hope for them to drop all available points from hereon. Same goes for two other sides in the mix - Southern Brave (12 points) and Manchester Originals (8 points).

Welsh Fire rekindled their dwindling fortunes in the season by tugging at the team that would've come into this game hoping to make up more ground on the teams above in their own quest for advancement. That determination didn't quite reflect in the way they started their innings after being asked to bat as Ben Duckett was cleaned up by Riley Meredith early.

The second-wicket pair - Will Smeed and Joe Clarke - moved on quickly but when Ben Kellaway stopped them in their tracks with the wicket of the latter, the innings began to unravel a touch. 58 for 3 turned to 76 for 4 which then became 85 for 5 before Benny Howell put his foot down and accompanied Jacob Bethell in an act of batting defiance. Meredith ended that - a 39-run stand - too and the Phoenix fizzled out at the end to finish with 138 for 9.

Fire's chase was propped up by an opening stand that ran well past the PowerPlay. Steve Smith and Stephen Eskinazi got 41 for 0 in the period, setting the chase up. They went on to stitch a partnership worth 72 in quick time, before Howell disrupted it with the wicket of Eskinazi for a 29-ball 42. At the halfway stage, Fire needed just 65 to get from the remaining 50 deliveries - nine runs fewer than they'd already made in the first half of the innings. One wicket didn't bring more for the Phoenix as Smith motored along, scoring his first 30-plus score in the tournament.

He did that with Jonny Bairstow at the other end, who put his touch to the proceedings in a bid to hasten the end - two fours (one leg bye) and a six in a five-ball set from Trent Boult. Howell still finished with appreciable figures of 1 for 17 in 20 balls on a slow surface, but Bairstow further narrowed the equation by going after Liam Livingstone. By the time Milne sent the Englishman packing with an inswinging yorker, he'd made 35 off 21, leaving Fire to get just 17 off 19. Smith scored 11 of those - with a six and four included, and captain Tom Abell sealed the win with a boundary.

Brief Scores:Birmingham Phoenix 138/9 in 100 balls (Jacob Bethell 38, Joe Clarke 24; Chris Green 3-27, Ben Kellaway 2-10, Riley Meredith 2-25) lost to Welsh Fire 140/2 in 89 balls (Steven Smith 47*, Stephen Eskinazi 42, Jonny Bairstow 35) by 8 wickets