Luke Heritage starred with bat and ball as Horspath 3rd bounced to winning ways with a five-wicket victory over Oxenford 2nd in Cherwell League Division 4B at Trinity College Sports Ground.
Making his seasonal debut, the off-spinner picked up 4-16 to help bowl Oxenford out for 138 after they were put in to bat and then top scored with an unbeaten 35 to steer Horspath home at 139-5.
Run outs by Jason Cardy and Josh Cummings reduced the hosts to 29-2. Div Puri (39) and Tim Rayden (27) steadied the ship, but after they fell to Cardy and Heritage respectively, Oxenford caved in as Ahmed Raza took 3-34 with the last seven wickets going down for 34 runs.
Manan Rathi made 26 as Horspath lost wickets at regular intervals in reaching 75-5, before Heritage was joined by Cardy (30no) in an unbroken sixth-wicket stand of 64 to secure victory with 15.4 overs to spare.
The win moves the side up two places to second spot ahead of Saturday's home game against unbeaten leaders Kingston Bagpuize, who defeated Chipping Norton by three wickets.
Horspath 4th slipped to 97-run defeat at home to Clifton Hampden in Division 6C.
Opener Morley Benson played the decisive innings with 90 as Clifton posted 209-7 after being put in to bat, well supported by Mark Stanway (31) and Richard Beard (29).
Stuart Berry (2-25) and Adrian Manger (2-30) produced tidy spells for the hosts.
Skipper Craig Wharton (33) and Fredrick Ekelund (21) got Horspath's run chase off to a solid start, before the innings fell away to 112 all out with Nkululeko Gumpo (22) the only other batsman into double figures.
Lawson Harvey (4-11) led the way for Clifton with Laurence Harvey (2-2), Kushagra Sundara (2-18) and Ben Wright (2-24) completing the task.
Horspath are away to Didcot 4th, who lost to Abingdon Vale 2nd by 106 runs, on Saturday.