South East Stars 221 for 7 (Davidson-Richards 90*, Moore 52*) beat Southern Vipers 220 for 9 (Harman 38, Corteen-Coleman 3-33) by three wickets
The South East Stars are through to the Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy final, after a thrilling fightback against the Southern Vipers in their semi-final at Beckenham.
There were seven balls remaining when Davidson-Richards hit Alice Monagan for a single to send the Stars through to the final. Davidson-Richards, who was dropped on 31, finished on 90, while Moore was unbeaten on 52 and the Stars will now face the Sunrisers in Saturday’s final at Grace Road.
The Vipers won the toss and chose to bat but lost Ella McCaughan in the third over for 2, caught behind off Corteen-Coleman.
Rhianna Southby made a quickfire 20, but she swatted a bouncer from Alexa Stonehouse to Emma Jones and visibly remonstrated with the umpires before heading back to the pavilion.
Phoebe Franklin then produced a superb forward diving catch at midwicket to get Naomi Dattani off Stonehouse for 9.
Danni Gregory got Georgia Elwiss for 34 with a rank ball she pulled straight to Jones and Emily Windsor then tried to cut Gregory and was bowled for 30.
Abi Norgrove was bowled by Kalea Moore for 25 before Nancy Harman and Alice Monaghan put on a useful 48 for the seventh wicket, although there was confusion at the end of the 36th over when the former hit a four and retained the strike. A single was also missed and as the scorers and analysts tried to work out what happened, Corteen-Coleman had Monaghan caught on the long-on boundary by Davidson-Richards for 26.
The same duo removed Harman, this time as Davidson-Richards sprinted round the boundary, before Freya Davies was run out by Franklin off the last ball of the innings for 7, leaving Ava Lee unbeaten on 14.
At the halfway point the Stars looked favourites but they lost Stonehouse for 10 when she skied Davies and Dattani took a steepling catch and Franklin then top-edged Davies and was snared by Lee for 7.
Elwiss then took two wickets in as many balls when she sent Chloe Hill’s off stump flying then bowled Kira Chathli, leaving Aylish Cranstone to block out the hat-trick ball.
The pivotal moment came when Davidson-Richards offered the simplest of caught-and-bowled chances to Lee and she was punching the air in anger when Lee somehow dropped her.
When Cranstone was caught and bowled in the next over from the Beckenham End, by Rebecca Tyson for 27, the Stars were in trouble on 94 for 5 and things looked bleaker still for the hosts when Emma Jones drove Dattani to cover and was caught by Elwiss for 7.
Priyanaz Chatterji was on 9 when Elwiss couldn’t cling on to a difficult return catch off her own bowling, but she couldn’t cash in as she drove Elwiss to Windsor having only added a single.
Moore, however, re-injected some belief into the chase and kept the Stars ticking over at a run a ball until 18 were needed from the last three.
Dattani bowled the 48th and it went for 14, effectively ending the contest and leaving Davidson-Richardson to hit the winning single.
