Despite minimal contributions from Rachel Priest, Western Storm are sitting at the top of the Women's T20 Super League table after all six teams have played eight games. Priest is joined by Sophie Devine and her Loughborough Lightning as the two best teams so far, both the Storm and Lightning have six wins and the other four teams are stuck on three, or two wins.

Only one innings with the bat this week for Priest as the Storm's game against Southern Vipers was abandoned 8.5 overs in. This left Suzie Bates stranded on 26 off 24, batting #4 for the Vipers with a strike-rate of 108.33. The Storm then went of to defeat Lancashire Thunder,

Priest scored 4 off 5 in the Storm's win over the Thunder, not much but better than Amy Satterthwaite's 4 off 6 as the Thunder were unable to chase down the Storm's target of 186, all out for 109 in 18.2 overs. It was a tough outing for Satterthwaite as she also conceded 12 runs off her 2 overs and on top of that she was stumped by Priest, one of three stumpings that Priest executed in the Thunder's innings.

This game was an out-lier for Satterthwaite though as the game earlier in the week saw her try valiantly in chasing Surrey Stars' 168 to win. Satterthwaite smoked 21 off just 11 deliveries (190.90sr), which wasn't enough as the Stars rolled the Thunder for 112. Then, later in the week Satterthwaite was once again the driving force for Lancashire as she hit 47 off 41 to help the Thunder reach 136/7 in their 20 overs against Loughborough.

Unfortunately, there's not much help for Satterthwaite in this Thunder batting line up and 136 was never enough. Sophie Devine blazed 22 off 12 @ 183.33 before being run out, with Devine scoring 22 of the Lightning's first 27 runs and Loughborough strolled to victory in the 15th over.

Devine continues to be the best-performing kiwi on the KCT bus. She was the bowler who dismissed Satterthwaite just as Satterthwaite was settling into her innings, with Devine taking 2w @ 10.66rpo in 3ov. Earlier in the week, Devine hit 16 off 13 and went wicket-less in her 3ov @ 9.33rpo in Loughborough's loss to Surrey; if Devine's not chiming in with runs or wickets then Loughborough are unlikely to win.

The leading KCT run-scorer is Satterthwaite, who is averaging 40.50 with a very handy strike-rate of 133.51. Satterthwaite is 3rd in runs overall, on 243 runs.

With just one 50+ score, Devine has still wiggled her way to 4th in runs and she has the second highest strike-rate of anyone with over 100 runs (152.23sr). In her 8inns, Devine has scored less than 10 runs just once and these solid contributions have come with Devine taking 1+ wicket in all but two games. That's good enough to keep Devine at the top of the wicket-taker rankings with 13w @ 13.07avg/6.58rpo.

There isn't much joy for Suzie Bates, Amelia Kerr or Sara McGlashan as their Southern Vipers continue to struggle. Things did get slightly better though as the Vipers played two games over the past week, losing that game to Devine's Lightning, after they grabbed a win over Yorkshire Diamonds. Funnily enough, the Vipers second win of the campaign came with Bates scoring 27 off 24 and taking 4w @ 6.78rpo in a typically slick all-round display from the legend.

Follow the 2018 Kia Super League here: www.ecb.co.uk/super-league Following a useful 27 at the top of the order, skipper Suzie Bates delivered a fine spell of 4-26 to see Southern Vipers victorious against Yorkshire Diamonds. This is the official channel of the ECB.

This was the first game of the Super League in which Bates has taken more than 1w, first time in 7inns. Bates got nice support from Kerr, who took 2w @ 5.50rpo and made a sneaky appearance batting #3 in which she scored 7 off 13.

Kerr and Bates have decent overall bowling records in the Super League thus far. They both have 7w, Kerr averages 24 and Bates averages 25, with Kerr more economical; 6.10rpo vs 8.53rpo.

I'll check in again after the next three games, which go down over the next few days. The kiwi Vipers are in action tomorrow morning and Satterthwaite is playing in the other fixture tomorrow, before Devine goes up against Priest the following day.

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Peace and love 27.