MARSHFIELD skipper James Williams accepts that his side face an uphill battle if they are to clinch this year’s WEPL Wiltshire title, despite defeating Calne convincingly at home on Saturday.

Williams’ men ended their latest league contest with little more than 40 overs bowled after skittling out the visitors for 122 before reaching their target within 15 overs.

Half-centuries for both Jeremy Bond and Patrick Grieshaber helped the hosts record their ninth victory of the season from 13 games.

But with 44 points separating themselves and table topping Warminster, Williams accepts his side cannot afford to slip up again with five fixtures remaining.

He said: “It was a good result for us on what was a tricky wicket.

“They took a couple of early wickets, but the way we responded to that - eventually making light work of our chase - was really good.

“The result is a confidence booster for us, and we’re pleased with where we are right now. It was good to see Jeremy (Bond) and Patrick (Grieshaber) score good runs too.”

The confidence boosting win injected a pinch of belief into Marshfield, who this week travel to league leaders Warminster in what has turned into a must win contest.

Williams’ troops have already tasted defeat to Warminster this season after suffering a five-wicket loss at home to Pete Hickerton’s side in June.

Admitting this season has been a frustrating one, Williams underlined that his side enter Saturday with little pressure on their shoulders given their current league position.

He said: “We set out wanting to win the league. In fairness, the results have been fair – we haven’t been playing as well as we would’ve liked.

“We’ve lost a couple of silly games and when you look at the gap now between ourselves and the top two, it’s getting to that 40-point stage. It’s unlikely we’ll catch them.

“But we have good distance between ourselves and Swindon in fourth, so we can enter this weekend relaxed.”

Elsewhere in WEPL Wiltshire, Devizes’ challenge for a top half finish continued when beating Corsham by 47 runs in a rain affected contest.

Following rain, the contest was reduced to 48 overs per side as Devizes completed their innings with little disruption.

A standout knock of 98 from Joe Wookey helped the home side build a foundation early on in the contest before eventually ending on 243-9 with other notable contributions from Matthew Tilley (49) and Courtney Earl (19).

Further rain meant Corsham’s target was revised to 150 from 23 overs under the duckworth-lewis ruling.

Wickets from Thomas Grant, Sumith Surendran, Courtney Earl and Harry Easton restricted the visitors’ progress as Corsham could only reach 128-6 from their allocated overs.

Devizes face a mid-table clash this Saturday when making the trip to Swindon to take on Alex Kill’s men at the County Ground.