Binfield Cricket Club's Women's 1st XI won by four wickets away at Oxford CC on Sunday 26 July 2026, chasing down 224 with four balls to spare in a Home Counties Women's Cricket League (HCWCL) Premier Division fixture. Evie Folwell made 55 and Jessica Jackson took 3 for 38 and scored 34, but it was Phebe Salter's unbeaten 36 from 25 balls that settled a chase which ran into the final over.

There are chases that are won in a glorious half-hour of hitting, and there are chases won by a side that simply refuses to be shaken off. This was emphatically the second sort. Binfield needed 224 at Jordan Hill on Sunday afternoon, spent the better part of thirty overs a nose behind the required pace, and got home with four balls of the fortieth over still unbowled. Good heavens, what a way to spend a July afternoon.

Oxford CC's captain Genny Porter won the toss, chose to bat, and then very nearly won the match on her own. She made 94 from 103 balls with nine fours and a six, and she was there for very nearly the whole of it - 13 not out when the second wicket fell, 42 not out at the third, 71 not out at the fourth. Ellie Montgomerie had given Binfield a wonderful start, removing Taylor Barlow leg before and then bowling Isla Cutler first ball to leave Oxford 28 for 2, and her eight overs for 27 were the meanest figures any Binfield bowler managed on the day. But Porter dug in, added 74 with Finnley Aston and then 50 more with Ella Robinson, and Oxford closed on 223 for 7.

The finish to that innings belonged to Jessica Jackson, who struck twice in successive deliveries at the very death - Ella Robinson caught and bowled for 36, then Ruby Wilkie stumped by Binfield's wicket-keeper Isobel Carson next ball - to finish with 3 for 38. Two wickets falling at the identical score of 213 in the last over of an innings is the sort of thing that looks like a detail at tea and rather more than a detail by six o'clock, given how the afternoon eventually turned out.

And then there is the extras column, about which there is no polite way around the arithmetic. Extras, for the uninitiated, are runs the fielding side gives away - wides, no-balls, byes - and they are added to the batting side's score. Of Binfield's 224, fully 52 were extras handed over by Oxford's bowlers, 38 of them wides. Put another way, Oxford's wides alone contributed more to Binfield's total than any Binfield batter bar Evie Folwell, whose 55 was the only larger contribution. Going the other way, Binfield's bowlers gave away just 23 while Oxford were batting - so Binfield were gifted 29 runs more than they gifted in return, in a match they won with four wickets standing and only four balls to spare. Oxford's Laura Jacob sent down 12 wides and Numa Shah 9 in spells that were otherwise perfectly respectable - 2 for 45 and 1 for 47 - which is cricket being cricket, and rather cruel about it.

For all that, the chase was built properly. Folwell batted with real composure for 55 from 71 balls with seven fours, anchoring stands of 24, 34 and then 60 with Jessica Jackson, who made a watchful 34 from 63. When Folwell went at 133 for 4 and Jackson at 160 for 5, Binfield still needed 64 with five wickets standing and the run rate beginning to make its presence felt. Oxford's bowlers were giving little away off the bat - Isla Cutler's eight overs had cost 25, Nell Griffin's five the same - and there were no easy runs on offer.

Which is where Phebe Salter took the innings by the hand. She had faced six balls for 3 while Jackson was in; from the moment Jackson departed she scored 33 from her next 19 deliveries - 18 from 8 in a stand of 25 with Rajbir Noble, then 15 from 11 in an unbroken 39 with Millie Roberts, who was excellent value for 12 not out from 13. Salter finished 36 not out from 25 balls with four fours, a strike rate of 144 in an innings where no other Binfield batter struck at better than 93. She had also, earlier in the afternoon, bowled eight overs for 30 while Oxford batted, and gave away not one wide herself - which, on the evidence of the extras column, was worth rather a lot. A thoroughly complete afternoon's work.

The worm tells the story better than any of us could. The two lines were locked together at 31 apiece after eight overs; Oxford then eased ahead, and by the sixteenth over Binfield were 17 adrift, which in a 40-over chase is a good deal more than it sounds. Binfield hauled level at exactly 160 apiece in the thirty-second over and never quite let go again. One does rather wonder how it might have read had Porter found another six runs, or had Oxford's bowlers sent down 20 wides instead of 38. Twenty league points to Binfield and six to Oxford does not move the Women's 1st XI off the foot of the HCWCL Premier Division - the gap to Oxford, immediately above them, merely narrows - but a chase of 224 against the side directly above you is a considerable afternoon's work by any measure. Oxford were gracious hosts and had the outstanding individual performance of the day in Porter's 94, and will feel this one for a while. Splendidly done indeed.