Hale Barns Second XI moved to within nine points of the promotion places following a convincing display with bat and ball against Alvanley CC.
Clive Collins struck an outstanding unbeaten century, while Peter Stubbs took five wickets during a magnificent eight-over spell as Barns triumphed by a handsome margin of 126 runs.
The hosts were put into bat for the first time in the league this season and made a slow start, with David Summers removing Tom Entwistle for 11. However, Collins looked well set to anchor the innings and received support from Sanjeev Bhatia and Stubbs, who both scored 18 to take the score to 110-3.
Andrew Willis began the process of increasing the run rate with almost a run-a-ball 25 before being run out, while Collins continued to accumulate after reaching his half century.
At 165-5, the returning Chris Colley was given an ideal platform to throw caution to the wind in the latter stages and targeted the boundary in typical fashion, hitting 26 off just 15 balls.
At the other end, Collins made the most of some loose death bowling by scoring his 13th four to become the second centurion in the 2s in consecutive weeks.
A flurry of late wickets from Summers (5-55) did little to dampen home spirits as Barns declared with an over to spare on 218-8, with Collins carrying his bat throughout the full innings on 101 not out.
HBCC were soon celebrating more success as Jack Wylie (1-32) made an early breakthrough to restrict the visitors to 12-1, but a handy partnership between David Evans (26) and J Evans (19) kept the home side honest and forced a change in bowling at each end.
And it was Stubbs who made an instant impact by dismissing both batsmen in quick succession, while Callum Schora picked up a wicket of his own as Alvanley slipped from 51-1 to 61-4.
With wickets tumbling, the dangerous Glenn Pickersgill (14) lost his composure and skied a wild stroke to Bhatia at mid-off to give Stubbs his third victim. At the other end, Schora (3-21) twice added to his tally as Barns homed in on a crushing victory.
Following on from Collins’ batting milestone in the first innings, Stubbs claimed his own with the ball by registering his first five-wicket haul since June 2016, taking terrific figures of 5-11 – including four wicket maidens.
Stubbs was also involved in the final dismissal of the match as he held on to a catch at short cover off the bowling of Charlie Romer (1-5) to bowl out the away team for 92 in 27.4 overs.