A superb ninth wicket partnership between James Sturgeon and George Loyd transformed a losing position into a potentially winning one for Bury St Edmunds, but in the end the hosts had to make do with a nail-biting draw against Burwell & Exning on Saturday.

A powerful century from Burwell captain, Joseph Tetley, had helped the visitors to a total of 267 all out in this rollercoaster Gibbs Denley East Anglian Premier League match at the Victory Ground.

Tetley struck 19 deliveries in his entertaining knock of 123, off 102 balls, rescuing Burwell from the perils of 91 for five. He put on 100 for the sixth wicket with a watchful Jamie Seabrook (56) to set Bury a challenging total.

Josh Cantrell, who finally broke this stand by having Seabrook caught by Dominic Manthorpe, finished with figures of 12.4-0-51-3, while Manthorpe, Alastair Allchin and Loyd all took a brace of wickets.

Bury’s reply got off to a poor start, Luke Du Plooy dismissed first ball by edging Sam Rippington to Paul Summerskill, but Murray Commins (24) and Tom Curran (69) added 75 for the second wicket. Curran struck 14 fours in his 85-ball effort.

Manthorpe contributed 37 at No. 4, putting on 50 for the seventh wicket with youngster Ben Whittaker (31), but it was looking grim when skipper Sean Cooper (2) was the eighth wicket to fall, with the total on 182, still 86 runs short of victory.

However, wicketkeeper Sturgeon (49 not out) and Loyd (22no) occupied the crease and threatened to even snatch an unlikely win, before Bury ran out of overs to finish on 255 for eight, off their 60 overs, 13 runs short of their ultimate goal.

Bury chairman, Paul Whittaker, explained: “In the end, we felt disappointed that we didn’t quite manage to get the win. We just ran out of overs.

“Our chances of winning were slim, until that late partnership, at which point the best tactics were to occupy the crease for the balance of the innings.

“We had to be realistic, because from a losing position we very nearly won the game. We just struggled to score enough runs, and looking back it was a case of ‘what might have been.’

“But it was nice to see a number of youngsters score runs. That’s our club policy, to give youngsters a chance and help them develop.”