MERRION WIN KEEPS PEMBROKE ON THEIR TOES - IBI CORPORATE FINANCE PREMIER LEAGUE & CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND-UP (JULY 13TH)

This afternoon's IBI Corporate Finance Premier League games saw wins for Merrion, Pembroke and Malahide, as the league really started to take shape approaching the halfway stage.

Meanwhile in the Championship, there were wins for Cork County, North Kildare, Rush and Railway Union, as the second tier still remains one game week short of the midway point of the season.

Kicking off with our featured action in Anglesea Road, Phoenix won the toss and elected to bat first with the early afternoon sun beaming through. The wicket appeared to be playing true, with only a pair of truly outstanding catches accounting for the first two wickets to fall, first Swapnil Modgill flying to his left at first slip off Mikey O'Reilly to dismiss Amish Sidhu, before Pete Francis then dove to his right at second slip to account for Jack Lalor off the bowling of Melvin Devaraj.

A solid stand of 60 between Johit Munjal and Shane Getkate moved the score to 85, before Munjal was snared behind by Adam Rosslee off the bowling of Sam Harbinson. Getkate then opened his shoulders to move along to 35, before he was dismissed to become Modgill's first wicket, falling with the score on 114. That wicket saw Tyrone Kane join Callum O'Byrne, for what would prove to be the most fruitful partnership of the innings. The pair added 60, before Kane slog-swept Modgill straight to Jamie Forbes to be dismissed for 32.

Adam Chester played the same shot to hole out this time to long-on where Stephen Doheny took a simple catch, before James Maginnis also skied one, this time back to Modgill who completed the catch off his own bowling. The score at this point moving to 184/7 and Phoenix in real danger of collapsing. Theo Dempsey added some brief respite, launching two massive sixes before being the 8th man to fall, this time to the returning Max Sorensen.

O'Byrne remained throughout, passing his 50 before he was eventually the 9th wicket to fall, also caught off Sorensen, this time at deep square leg by Forbes, finishing with 52 from 68 balls. When Dev Ranolia and Ben White ended up at the same end, the run out was affected and the innings finished Phoenix 230 all out with 7 overs unused.

The second innings got off to a solid start, Doheny finding the boundary early before Modgill became the first man to fall to Sidhu, stumped by Chester in the fourth over of the chase, this brought Rosslee to the crease, with the pair adding an excellent stand of 92, and both passing 50, before Doheny pulled Dempsey in the air to mid-on, where Lalor took a good catch over his head.

Rosslee continued on through drinks, adding 27 with Harbinson before being bowled by an absolute beauty from Amish Sidhu to fall for 76, and see Pete Francis join his skipper in the middle. A spectacular caught and bowled from White saw Francis dismissed, before Lewis and Harbinson added 37 for the 5th wicket, when Lewis was caught behind for 15. A further 26 was added between the skipper and Jamie Forbes, before Harbinson was out for 44, bowled by White to give him his third.

That wicket saw Mikey O'Reilly join Forbes at the crease with 23 needed to win, and the pair added the runs in the second last over, finishing 12 and 23 not out respectively in a 6 wicket win.

Elsewhere, in Balbriggan, the home side batted first, but could manage only 175 all out in the 49th over, as Chris de Freitas top scored with a 78-ball 61. Byron McDonough was the pick of the bowlers for the away side, taking 5/26, whilst Paul Lawson also took 2/24. Pembroke chased the runs down in 38.2 overs, thanks primarily to excellent contributions of 72 from Tim Tector and 75 from Nick Stapleton, as they added an unbeaten stand of 137 for the third wicket to secure an eight wicket win.

In The Village, Malahide made 215/8, as Adam Doyle top scored with 46, whilst there were contributions in the 30s from Cormac McLoughlin-Gavin, Andy Sheridan and Mohit Sane which dug the side out of a potentially precarious position of 112/5. Cillian McDonnell the pick of the bowlers for the away side, taking 3/30 from his 10 overs. The chase saw Clontarf making 176 all out in 43.1 overs, as David Delany's 47 was the only score in excess of 30, as three wickets for each of James Newland and Mohit Sane secured the win for the home side.

In the Championship, the league leaders North County knocked Cork County over for just 174 in The Mardyke, Syed Aiman top scoring for the home side with 31 as Alan Joseph Mathew took 3/28, whilst there were two wickets each for Eddie Richardson and Ashish Jain. The chase however saw the away side collapse to just 89 all out, as there were two wickets for each of Mark Andrianatos, Suliman Safi, Ehsan O'Sullivan and Nabeel Anjum in securing a brilliant 85 run win for the Leesiders.

In Terenure, the home side batted first and made 264 all out inside 47 overs, thanks primarily to 83 from returning opener Donal Vaughan, whilst there were 30s for Sid Nair and Raghav Grover, the pick of the bowlers being Husnain Maroof who took 3/35. North Kildare's chase was stunted early on, however they dug in and kept fighting hard, as scores of 43 from Husnain Maroof, 45 from Bakhtyar Nabi and 39 from Badeeu Zaman helped them to a 1 wicket victory in the 46th over of the innings.

In Park Avenue, Railway Union batted first and they also made 264 for 9 in their 50 overs, as Philippe le Roux top scored with 85, and all of the top 5 passed 20. Nicolaj Damgaard the pick of the bowlers for the away side taking 3/52, whilst Brandon Kruger also took 2/30. The Hills' run chase saw plenty of starts, however the highest score was Damgaard's 33, as Johnny Woods took 4/36, and Sean O'Brien 3/22, as Railway ran out 74 run winners.

Finally in Civil Service, the home side batted first and 60 from Arjun Chandrasekar guided them to 198 all out, as Rush saw two wickets for each of Jarred Barnes, Nasir Totakhil and Asher Abbasi. Josh Doyle made 51 to get Rush off to a great start, however they fell to 161/9 thanks to four wickets for Chandrasekar and two for Naveed Khan. That saw Abbasi joined by Allan Eastwood, and they added the 38 runs needed for victory to lead the side to a 1 wicket win!