His Mowers had first made 221.
But Echuca, at 5-192 midway through its 46th over, were in with a real chance of chasing them down.
And inflicting a second loss of the season on Moama.
It would’ve been shocking for the reigning GMC champion to sit 3-2 after five matches.
So Saunders decided to set his team on a different path.
Archer Carlile was the first victim.
Then Saunders ripped through Charlie Hinks’ stumps with a sweet delivery — the end of the 48th seeing the Moama quick bowling to Anthony Dennis before Kale Edwards was run out.
Anthony McMahon relieved his in-form teammate in the 49th, and did some major damage himself by removing Echuca’s highest scorer Dennis.
But this day, this innings, belonged to Saunders.
So it was fitting he crossed up Taj Maddox for an lbw to complete a ludicrous late flurry — three wickets in the final 21 balls, and Echuca all gone for 209.
“Matt’s had an excellent start to the season,” Moama captain Joel Murphy said of Saunders.
“He's obviously a really skilful bowler, and he's always swinging the ball, but on Saturday the work right at the death was awesome.
“He really closed the innings out for us when we seemed to be in a danger period.”
Murphy said Saunders’ sustained swinging off the seam was why he had taken nine wickets in four matches.
But what specifically about this last spell had the Echuca batters stumped?
“He was able to hit his spots really well, and I think by the end we set the right fields,” Murphy said.
“Then he just nailed some yorkers and change-ups.”
And his teammates would’ve been quite appreciative afterwards.
Because, as Murphy said, the side was in some trouble.
Two losses this early would’ve been unacceptable for the Mowers, who the captain himself said, “have pretty high standards”.
At the same time, the champion loves a challenge.
Which it doesn’t always get from the opposition.
“It was probably good to be in that situation,” Murphy said.
“Over the last year and at times this year we've had many easy wins, and obviously a few losses.
“But to get a tight game in like that, whichever way it went was going to be invaluable to get that practice.
“It came down to the wire, and we were lucky enough to get over the line.”
Before the round five win, Moama had dropped a game to Kyabram.
So the tests are becoming more typical.
But outside the one slip-up, there were victories by 68 runs, seven wickets, and 242 runs.
Pretty easy.
And next up is Echuca South, which is second-bottom with only one win.
Murphy might have to contend with a more straightforward success this time around.
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