South Devon made it three wins on the bounce when beating visiting Braunton by a comfortable six wickets.

The home side ended up chasing 203 after the visitors’ captain Jon Baglow, in at number 10, scored 33 not out to take his side from 155-8 past the 200 mark.

In response, South Devon’s chase was centred around a fine innings of 73 not out from opener David Knowles, who shared in a first wicket partnership of 43 with Mark Andrews (34) then, significantly, added 73 with Paul Hooper (22) for the fourth wicket.

Knowles was accompanied past the winning target by his captain Jon Martin (30 not out), who hit five boundaries to win the game with more than seven overs to spare.

The only blip along the way was the loss of two wickets in as many deliveries with the score on 65. However, Knowles and Hooper batted sensibly to make sure the damage was limited.

Neil Bettis picked up three wickets at an eventual cost of 50 from seven overs.

After the opening bowlers had failed to make a breakthrough, Bettis came on to account for Andrews, Divan Marais and Alistair Wright and looked set for impressive figures until he lost his line and ended up conceding 50 runs from seven overs.

The only other bowling success was down to Baglow, who bowled Hooper with the first ball of his second spell.

Earlier, Braunton had batted inconsistently. After losing Rob Collier (five) – bowled by Martin – with only 12 on the board, fellow opener Alfie Huxtable and Bettis took the score along to 108.

The introduction of James Allen made the difference as Braunton lost seven wickets in adding only 47 runs. The young spinner picked up Huxtable’s wicket thanks to a head-high catch by Knowles, and went on to claim three more wickets to finish with 4-37 from nine overs, which included a couple of maidens.

Martin returned to the attack to remove Bettis, Emily Martin and Knowles each claimed two wickets to eventually wrap up Braunton’s innings.

As a consequence of Baglow’s efforts, Braunton’s total became competitive but thanks to Knowles and his supporting batsmen, South Devon banked another 20 points to add to the 38 garnered from the previous two wins.

Despite this haul, the Newton Abbot-based club are still in the relegation zone in a division where three out of the ten clubs go down. At least South Devon moved up a place and now sit above both Thorverton and Dartington & Totnes.

Tomorrow South Devon will be aiming to keep their good run going when they travel to fourth-placed Bideford.