Shrewsbury School U15s claim Midlands title
Shrewsbury School Under 15s won the Midlands Schools T20 finals to qualify for the national finals at Arundel at the end of August.
Hosting the Midlands finals, Shrewsbury found themselves up against Loughborough Grammar School in the semi-final.
After winning the toss and batting first, they found themselves in trouble after losing early wickets.
Lower order runs from George Jenkins (40) and Hugo Odd (23) helped them recover to reach 119 before the last wicket fell off the final ball of the innings
After a superb start to their innings at 58-1 and well ahead of the required run rate, the Loughborough batsmen then struggled when the Shrewsbury spinners were introduced into the attack.
This enabled the hosts to take control of the match bowling the visitors out for 105 to win by 14 runs. Reuben Kundu 3-6 & Arjan Barard 3-28 were the pick of the Shrewsbury attack.
Bedford came through the other semi-final, beating Repton by 35 runs after making an imposing 157-2 in their innings.
They batted first again in the final but they had no answer to the excellent Shrewsbury spin bowlers and were dismissed for a just 72 in the 19th over.
Kundu 2-14 & Barard 4-4 off their four overs again excelled and were well supported by the other Shrewsbury spinners.
The Shrewsbury openers, Gurj Athwal (34no) and skipper Will Parkinson-Witte (32no) quickly knocked off the required runs to leave Shrewsbury the comfortable winners by 10 wickets.
They now go on to represent Shropshire and the Midlands in the national finals at Arundel on August 31.
Meanwhile, Shrewsbury School U17s reached the national semi-final of their age group by beating Scarborough College in the quarter-final with opener Liam Grindley top scoring with 80.
However, they lost the semi-final to a very strong Rugby School team who won the 35 overs a-side-match by seven wickets. Isaac England top scored for Shrewsbury with 52 while Harrison Vaughan continued his good form this season by taking 2-32.