Peterborough Town suffered a slow death on a thrilling afternoon at Bretton Gate, but a big win for Oundle Town

It was a frustrating afternoon for the city side ahead of a couple of big games, at neighbours Oundle Town on Saturday (11am), and then at home to high-flying Stony Stratford the following weekend (July 11).

Town came into their game against Old Northamptonians – a misleading name for a very young team – in buoyant form having won back-to-back close matches in the competition, as well as making progress in the ECB Club KO.

But a hat-trick of tight Premier Division victories eluded them as they went down by seven runs after a cracking contest when fortunes fluctuated regularly and dramatically.

Town had recovered from 64-4 and 128-6 to get within 15 runs of passing ONs’ 200 all out with four wickets in hand.

But a superb diving catch ended Nick Green’s excellent 76 and Town lost their last three wickets for just eight runs. A stunning caught and bowled completed victory for the visitors who themselves had fallen from 87-1 to 117-6 before counter-attacking to post what proved to be a winning score. Town failed to find a ruthless streak at the end of each innings.

Town would normally have few qualms about chasing down 200 on their own free-scoring ground, but alarm bells were ringing at half-time as nine of the wickets they have taken had fallen to spin on a used wicket that was hardly likely to become more helpful to batting, and slow bowling was a strength of the talented ONs.

Crucially both openers fell to seam before the visitors turned the screw with three off spinners. Some shots played by Town batsmen made little sense, but skipper David Clarke (25) and Green weathered one storm before the latter was joined by Jaskaran Singh to add 58 for the seventh wicket.

Town looked set to win, but an ill-timed drinks break halted their momentum and Green fell straight after hitting an enormous six, before Singh, after showing great patience, made one untimely charge too many to fall for 18 soon afterwards.

In total 16 wickets fell to spin with Karanpal Singh (3-27), Raturaj Kale (3-48) and Josh Smith (3-48) doing the bulk of the work for Town.

Town remain third, but have slipped 27 points behind the top two.

Oundle responded in style to a 50-point deduction that would appear to have wrecked their title hopes in a bicentennial season. A harsh punishment for an unwitting admin error has left them next-to-bottom, where they remain despite a 97-run win at Overstone Park.

Captain Mark Hodgson (79) and Will Park (70) got the Oundle innings off to a flier before some late hitting from Will Compton (42no, 25 balls) and Sam Batten (41no) pushed them up to 290-6.

The Craig brothers Conor (5-42) and Harrison (3-41) then helped hustle the home side out for 193 with just 11 balls to go. Oundle have appealed their points deduction.

Standings (all played 6): 1 Finedon 125pts, 2 Stony Stratford 125pts, 3 Peterborough Town 98pts, 4 Old Northamptonians 96pts, 5 Geddington 85pts, 6 Kislingbury 71pts, 7 Overstone 69pts, 8 Loddington 46pts, 9 Oundle Town 41pts, 10 Rushden & Higham 117pts.