Clackmannan travelled to Edinburgh knowing that victory over third placed Stewarts Melville Royal High would guarantee promotion.

Upon winning the toss, Clackmannan decided to bowl on a green looking wicket with the usual openers of Hefer and Ashraf being their miserly selves, limiting SMRH to only 21 runs off the first 10 overs.

There was to be no let up when they were replaced by Silva and Khan who kept the batsmen tied down until the pressure told with Brown being bowled by Silva for 10 in the 14th over with the score on 29 for 1.

Khan then got on a roll, bowling with good pace and control, dismissing 3 batsmen, including SMRH leading run scorer Burgess for 0 to finish with figures of 3 for 12 off 9 overs. SMRH continued to bat in a dogged fashion but at no time were they able to break free and up the scoring rate and were all out on the final ball of their 45 overs for 135. The wickets were shared amongst the bowlers and most observers believed that SMRH were about 50 runs below par.

Any nerves were removed by Clackmannan opener Mehboob who opened the innings in his usual aggressive manner, playing a number of forceful shots off the back foot as SMRH bowled too short.

The fifty partnership was brought up in only the eighth over with Hefer only contributing 7 of those runs. When Hefer fell soon after, there was to be no let up in the scoring rate as Graham Oliver played some lovely drives to support Mehboob who continued to hit the ball around the ground until he fell for 72 off only 48 balls in an innings that contained 10 fours and 1 six.

The score now read 100 for 2 but Oliver was then run out in the same over and SMRH felt they had a ‘sniff’. However, the experienced Rasul marshalled the next couple of batsmen to make sure that the score kept moving with Alamgir hitting the winning runs through extra cover to bring up victory in only 28 overs for a 5 wicket victory, Rasul finishing 15 not out.

Parkside Driving School Man of the Match goes to Tariq Mehboob for his scintillating innings that really put SMRH on the defensive and made the run chase very straight forward.

Clackmannan finish the season when they entertain West Lothian at the Arns on Saturday, where victory could still give them the ESCA second division title.