Nic Pothas provided the sort of innings that was once a regular feature of his repertoire, but has been missing for the last couple of seasons, to take the Highveld Strikers to a thrilling five-wicket victory with two balls of their 45 overs to spare.

Pothas belted 79 off just 77 balls, the last 26 coming off just 18 deliveries, to see his side through to their victory target of 226 in 44.4 overs, after they had faced an asking rate of eight to the over in the latter stages. Forty-eight were needed off the last six, then 31 off the last four and 18 off the last two. That was when Pothas really came into his own as Kenny Benjamin's last over went for 14, taking the match away from the visitors.

It was a bitter pill to swallow for the team from Benoni, just 35km away, as they suffered their third defeat in six days to see their chances of reaching the semi-finals diminish even further. Prior to their match against Boland on January 5, Easterns had been sitting pretty with four wins from five matches. Now, despite gaining a bonus point in each of those three matches, they find themselves outside the top four with two difficult matches, away to Eastern Province and at home to Free State, to come.

In truth, the visitor's defeat was partly of their own making. Having won the toss and chosen to bat, Easterns got off to a great start as Mike Rindel and new recruit Andre Seymore put on 120 for the first wicket, before being separated at the halfway mark of the innings, in the 23rd over, when Seymore was bowled by Clive Eksteen for 46.

At that point, they were looking good for a total beyond 250, but Rindel ran himself out just 12 runs later for 60, made off just 63 balls, including 22 off Eksteen's first two overs, and after that, Easterns were never able to sustain the same scoring rate. It fell below five to the over, only getting up to that mark again through some good late hitting and running by captain Deon Jordaan and Aldo van den Berg. That enabled them to reach 225 for seven, which proved to be just short of what they needed.

For the Strikers, after a woeful season, the victory over a team including many former Strikers players salvaged some much-needed pride, given that they can no longer qualify for the semi-finals.

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