Weston Creek won its way through to the semi-final of the Konica Minolta Regional Cup with a victory against Eastlake in the Twenty20 series at Kingston Oval on Sunday.
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The visitors executed their game plan, restricting Eastlake to 116 runs, thanks largely to an economical opening spell by spinner Michael Minns. ''He went four overs for nine runs and against a player like Michael Spaseski, to do that is no mean feat, so he should be pretty happy with himself,'' captain Adam Rhynehart said.
Captain Adam Tett settled Eastlake, producing a game-high total, but was eventually caught agonisingly short of his half century on 49.
Weston Creek scored at a steady rate to reach its target comfortably in the 18th over.
''A few of the batters - Chris Poulton (23) and Byron Field (16) then Harry Bryant (22) and Harry Medhurst (32) in the middle - controlled the ship and the Eastlake boys never really looked like restricting our total,'' Rhynehart said.
The meticulous victory left Weston Creek confident ahead of the semi-final in January. ''We don't know who we're playing but we know we're a team that can pull out anything come game time, so whoever it is we do face, we know we'll be pretty confident of a good show.''
At Jamison Oval, Wests/University of Canberra had no trouble accounting for ANU, dismissing the visitors 70 runs short of their total in the 16th over.
Opening pair Darren Richards (59) and Adam Hewitt (40) set Wests/UC up for a huge total of 7-183, and the daunting target became worse when ANU's number two and three batsmen, Andrew Stead and Akshay Nichkawde were dismissed for ducks.
Michael Bennett (23) provided a partner for Friday Kasteni to amass 60 runs, but they were the only players to crack double figures as ANU was all out for 113 runs.
Tuggeranong played Illawarra in Sunday's other qualifying final, with Queanbeyan to play Albury-Wodonga next weekend.