New City dig their heels in to draw but Milton Keynes still climb up the table

Joe Fairbrother traps Raghunath Santhanakrishnan LBW.

In a high-scoring encounter at the Pavilion in Milton Keynes Village, MK picked up 18 points to move above Olney but didn’t have as much joy with the ball as their opponents on the day.

MK made a great start to the innings, batting first. There were solid knocks from Nimesh Chavda (42), Neil Gordon 3-49(24) and Kaushik Sunkara (35), while Danushka Perera top scored for the home side with a valuable 68.

But opening bowler Manjit Singh began to find his rhythm and broke up partnerships at key moments on his way to figures of 4-46.

The runs kept on coming though, as MK were eventually bowled out for 271.

Joe Fairbrother, pictured inset, struck almost immediately into the response, trapping Raghunath Santhanakrishnan in the second over, but Dhruv Pankhania (19), Dharmesh Mistry (36) and Amit Mulay (56) settled things.

Manjit Singh turned provider with the bat too, top scoring for New City with 58 as the visitors held out.

Nirosha Wijenayake took 3-49 for MK, but New City’s stubborn batting meant, while they weren’t ever troubling the home side for victory, a draw was on the cards.

New City closed on 223-8, taking 13 points, while MK took 18.