Royston Cricket Club have clinched a fourth consecutive victory as they defeated Wilburton at home in a tightly-fought game.

Royston captain Martin Leary won the toss and invited the visitors to bat first, and it was a decision that appeared to be correct as Max Kindred (8-0-30-2) removed the Wilburton number one and three both for nought with the score at 11-2.

Leary came into the attack as first change and soon Conor Logan (19) fell to a sharp catch in the cover from Phil Hall.

Some poor shot selection from the middle order saw Wilburton then crumble to 84-6 before the returning Pete Merrell (9-2-47-2) saw the visitors reduced further to 127-9.

However a stubborn 10th wicket partnership of 35 between Matt Morton (33) and Marcus Brook (8*) saw Wilburton fight their way up to 162 before Leary dismissed Morton to end with impressive figures of 7.3-1-27-6.

The Royston response got off to a shaky start as Sharad Menon was castled by Oliver Sellars for a duck only to be quickly followed by the dismissals of Bonham Harper and Paul Leary, both for single figures, with the score at 30-3.

Martin Leary and Paul Miller took the score up to 62 before a miscued drive from Leary saw him depart.

The arrival of Rob Gill saw a flurry of boundaries as he rocketed his way to a quick-fire 28, however he then lost his off-stump to Brook and was followed by Montague-Fuller as Royston stuttered at 93-6.

Supported by Kindred and Shahvaiz Younus, Miller paced his innings to perfection and brought up his half century with aplomb. Pete Merrell joined him in the middle with eight wickets down and 18 runs still required, and calmly struck two sublime boundaries through the off-side as Royston came home to win by two wickets. Miller ended on 74*.

“Paul batted superbly”, said his skipper. “He’s a quality batsman and we’ve seen him play similar innings before in order to dig us out of trouble; today was another great effort on his part.

“In hindsight we probably let them get about 40 runs too many however it’s obviously extremely pleasing to record our fourth win of the season in as many games.”

Royston have now lost just once in their last 25 league games. This Saturday they travel to Great Chishill.