England Lions 163 for 1 (Kohler-Cadmore 80*, Hain 48*) beat West Indies A 162 (Dawson 4-21, Topley 4-16) by nine wickets
Scorecard
Hampshire's Liam Dawson and Reece Topley readied themselves for Saturday's Royal London One-Day Cup final at Lord's by bowling the Lions to a comfortable victory as West Indies A slumped to a third defeat in the Tri-Series.
The pair took four wickets each as their opponents were dismissed for a paltry 162 after Steven Mullaney, the Lions captain, had chosen to bowl first on a green-tinged Wantage Road pitch. An unbroken stand of 120 between Tom Kohler-Cadmore (80) and Sam Hain (48) ensured all those who wanted to watch the other England side in action today were showered and changed in plenty of time.
The result means that the Lions progress to Monday's series final at The Oval and there had been a question mark over whether the duo would be available as Hampshire take on Kent at Lord's with this competition not yet completed. But Lions head coach Mark Ramprakash confirmed that they will be allowed to join their county teammates for practice at Lord's on Friday.
India A, who are all square with the Lions after avenging defeat at Derby last week with an impressively emphatic win at Leicester on Tuesday, will be the other side in the Tri-Series final. Their match with West Indies A at Northampton on Friday is now a dead rubber.
Three of Topley's four wickets came in his opening five overs as the West Indian approach of being aggressive from the start quickly backfired.
Jermaine Blackwood, who drove Tom Helm for two boundaries in the Middlesex seamer's first over, went for a muscular pull against Topley but miscued it horribly and Sam Hain, the outstanding figure in the field for the Lions, took a comfortable catch at point. Likewise, Chandrapaul Hemraj, who had flat-batted Helm for six over square leg, just avoiding Ed Barnard on the boundary, then top-edged one from Topley and Hain made another well judged catch.
The only phase in the innings in which West Indies made meaningful progress came after Andre McCarthy had become a third victim for Topley, who was returning to the Lions line-up after being rested for Tuesday's match against India A.
Sunil Ambris and Devon Thomas added 67 without further mishap, but having reached a position from which they might have pushed the accelerator pedal, Ambris spooned a catch straight to mid-off to give the captain, whose teasing medium pace is a regular partnership breaker for Nottinghamshire, a wicket in his third over.
With Topley replacing Lancashire's Matt Parkinson, the Lions had gone with only one spinner this time but Mullaney could not have done better job in giving Dawson the chance to attack, although in the event the left-armer barely bowled a loose delivery and between the 21st and the 37th overs while the two were in tandem there was not one boundary scored.
Indeed, Dawson did not concede any boundaries in his full 10 overs, which would have been an achievement in itself in a 50-over match even without his four wickets. As it was he bowled Rahkeem Cornwall, playing back, and (Devon) Thomas, pushing forward, to record a 'double' with a west country flavour, before Jomel Warrican holed out to midwicket and Sherman Lewis was trapped in front.
In the middle of all that, a piece of sharp and athletic fielding by Hain ran out Raymon Reifer. Topley returned to claim his fourth success when Oshane Thomas skied one to third man.
Bizarrely, Kohler-Cadmore could have been caught twice in the first three balls he faced, bowled by the tall pace bowler Oshane Thomas, but both chances were put down, the first - and most straightforward - off a short-pitched delivery that Hemraj should have held at backward square leg. The chance to Blackwood at slip the next ball was more difficult, yet he had both hands on it briefly. Thomas was less than happy.
The Yorkshire batsman emphatically put the errors behind him, hitting eight fours and two sixes, one of them out of the ground over the Signal Box, the other landing in the car park behind the Spencer Pavilion. The West Indies A captain made bowling changes as if it were a T20, using eight bowlers in all, none of whom made much difference, although the off-spinner Cornwall could claim an 'assist' perhaps, having bowled the ball from which the aforementioned skipper, having failed to make a stumping, recovered the ball to run out Nick Gubbins.
