Steve Elworthy once again puts up his hand

With one round of matches to go the SuperSport Series is heading for a climax after Western Province dropped into third place and KwaZulu-Natal leapfrogged Northerns into the top spot. This three horse race, with Easterns maybe having an outside chance, will be settled this coming weekend when Natal take on Province in Cape Town and Northerns travel to Benoni to face Easterns. Griqualand West and Eastern Province will contest the wooden spoon in Port Elizabeth.

In Kimberley KwaZulu-Natal gained a 10 wicket win over Griqualand West to go to the top of the log with 58.60 points. A superb 172 from Jonty Rhodes makes one wonder why the little genius decided to prematurely end his test career. His fellow test discard, Lance Klusener, also showed the selectors that he is still a class act in taking 10/107 off 37.5 overs in the match. Contributions of 57 and 56 from the Amla brothers helped to set up a comfortable Dolphins win. A career best 6/45 from Martin Gidley was just not enough to keep his team in the game.

At Centurion Park bad light put paid to what looked like an exciting end to the Northerns, Western Province match. Chasing 422 for a win Western Province at 244 for 2 and still 40 overs available looked set for an upset with both Andrew Puttick (ending on 107) and HD Ackerman (undefeated on 140) at the crease. A second delay for bad light however saw both sides accepting the draw.

Pierre Joubert 112*, Johan Myburg 51 and Gerald Dros 50 had earlier helped Northerns to 394 for nine declared after which Steve Elworthy raced through the Province batting to take 6/50 and establish himself as the leading wicket taker in the SuperSport Series. One wonders why he was at Centurion and not in Cape Town for the test.

Easterns and Eastern Province contested a close battle for three days before Eastern Province capitulated and was bowled out for 72 in their second innings. Andre Nel came away with match figures of 8/86 while a century in the first innings from stalwart Dave Callaghan was not enough to keep Eastern Province off the bottom of the table.

In the SuperSport Shield Free State extended their lead on the table with a innings win over Boland while Gauteng moved up the ladder to second spot after a 94 run win against North West.