Fire crush Phoenix to stave off elimination

The Hundred men’s competition, Edgbaston

Birmingham Phoenix 138-9 (100 balls): Bethell 38 (28); Green 3-27

Welsh Fire 140-2 (89 balls): Smith 47* (36), Eskinazi 42 (29)

Fire won by eight wickets

Welsh Fire cruised to a comprehensive eight-wicket win over Birmingham Phoenix to keep their fading hopes of reaching The Hundred men’s knockout stages alive.

Defeat at Edgbaston would have ended their chances of making the top three but after restricting Phoenix to 138-9, they knocked off the runs with 11 balls to spare.

Opener Stephen Eskinazi made a quickfire 42 and Jonny Bairstow, moved down to three, came in and thumped 35 off 21 balls, while Steve Smith batted through the innings for an unbeaten 47 off 36 as Fire made light work of the chase.

Earlier, wickets fell regularly during a Phoenix innings that repeatedly threatened to ignite but never quite did so.

Jacob Bethell top-scored with 38 from 28 balls, while Chris Green took 3-27 for Fire and his fellow off-spinner Ben Kellaway claimed 2-10 on debut.

The result leaves both sides on eight points, still eight back of Northern Superchargers in third, with two games left to play, meaning qualification remains unlikely.

Phoenix came into the match knowing a win would put them level on points with Southern Brave in fourth.

They would have backed themselves to see off the bottom-placed side, especially at home, and put themselves in the thick of it in the fight for the top three.

Yet they end the evening level on points with Fire and needing snookers to qualify.

Even after losing Ben Duckett cheaply, they built a strong foundation through Will Smeed and Joe Clarke – only for both to fall in quick succession when they looked set to kick on, the latter to a particularly soft dismissal.

Liam Livingstone then arrived, full of intent, to bludgeon a pair of enormous sixes as Bethell settled at the other end but he fell before he could do any significant damage.

Bethell was forced to hold back slightly to avoid a full-on collapse but kicked into gear late on, only to hole out with four balls left.

It is another four-day game on Saturday with double-headers seeing Northern Superchargers host Oval Invincibles (11:00 and 14:30 BST) and London Spirit face Southern Brave (14:30 and 18:00 BST).

There will be ball-by-ball radio commentary on every game on BBC Sounds.