Western Australia 319 for 9 (Curtis 75, Hardie 64, Turner 47, Wyllie 42*) beat Tasmania 318 (Webster 138, Ward 112, Jackson 4-55, Couch 3-50) by one wicket
Struggling at 21 for 3 in the eighth over after being sent in at the WACA on Tuesday, Tasmania recovered to score 318, despite losing 6 for 25 at the end of their innings.
But the tons weren’t enough to maintain Tasmania’s unbeaten record after they’d won their first five games as WA went on to win with eight balls to spare, achieving the highest-ever domestic one-day run chase at the WACA.
It was their third victory in six matches and kept alive their chances of making the final.
But the loss of Hardie for his highest List A score and Sam Whiteman in successive overs looked to have dented WA’s hopes.
Captain Ashton Turner gave them renewed hope with a quickfire 47 off 28 balls, before falling to a tremendous catch from Nikhil Chaudhary.
Malajczuk, who recently scored the fastest century ever at the Under-19 World Cup, powered a massive six over deep backward square leg off Tassie speedster Riley Meredith, but was yorked next ball.
Webster scored only 28 off his first 51 balls, striking just two fours, before going through the gears. He muscled several powerful shots down the ground and over the legside boundary, belting thirteen fours and four sixes.
Ward started with fluent, well-timed driven boundaries off each of his first three deliveries and continued to pierce the field with some fine shots.
But Webster did not return to bowl for Tasmania, with a reported Achilles issue.