Richmondshire firsts made two productive visits to Thornaby in four days.
The first came on Wednesday in the Premier League Collinwood 100 Final.
Thornaby have become the leagues limited over specialists in recent seasons, but they were defeated by nine wickets in an outstanding Richmondshire performance.
Choosing to bat first Thornaby made 126 for eight, with Ajay Mandal taking three for 21 and Craig Marshall two for 19.
After losing Tom Dowson from the first ball of the innings Ajay Mandal (68 not out) and Gray Pratt (43) not out knocked off the runs in 79 balls.
Saturday’s Premier League programme was again significantly affected by rain, as only one fixture was settled without recourse to Duckworth Lewis scoring.
Put into bat, Richmondshire made 218 for seven, Bob Carr with 58, Gary Pratt 59 and Ajay Mandal 64 not out, scoring the bulk of the runs.
With a rain interruption Thornaby were set a revised target of 181 from 35 overs but restricted by tight Richmondshire bowling were unable to get anywhere near this. They ended on 117 with Ajay Mandal taking three for 18 and Shaun Charlton two for 35.
The 25 points keeps Richmondshire top of the table but with Barnard Castle also taking 25 the gap at the top remains the same.
This Saturday sees professional Ajay Mandal’s last game of the season as he returns to India for his sister’s wedding.
In outstanding form with bat and ball, he will be seriously missed in the final four games of the season.
The 2nd team went down by ten wickets after a disastrous batting performance against Sedgefield 1sts. Bowled out for just 76 Sedgefield took only 13.3 overs to knock off the runs without loss.
The 4th team’s top of the table clash with Stockton at Richmond School fell victim to the rain after 17.3 overs of the Stockton innings.
In that time Richmondshire had reduced Stockton to 41 for six, with Michael Platt taking four for 8.
This gave Richmondshire nine points to Stockton’s seven keeping Richmondshire top of division four.
The 5ths were forced to concede their game at Spennymoor.
On Sunday the 3rds had a nine wicket win at Darlington 3rds. Dismissing Darlington for just 91, with Andy Dade taking four for eight and Alex Percival three for 10.
With captain John Clark keeping up his good form with the bat to make 47 not out, the runs were knocked off in 17.4 overs.
The 20 points sees Richmondshire continuing to move up the table and well out of the relegation places.