Bury St Edmunds suffered a dramatic batting collapse as they slumped to a nine-wicket defeat at Cambridge Granta on Saturday, to leave them a distant 41 points adrift of safety at the foot of the East Anglian Premier League.

Out-of-sorts Bury lost 10 wickets for just 50 runs, nose-diving from 86 without loss to 136 all out.

Granta then sped to victory inside 30 overs, for the loss of just one wicket, to inflict an eighth defeat in 11 matches on the Victory Ground club.

Bury will need to improve in leaps and bounds during the second half of the season to avoid relegation, which is something that they have at least managed to achieve in recent years thanks to a strong late summer surge.

“There is no need to panic yet, because we are only half-way through the season,” explained Bury captain Sean Park, whose side recorded a first win of the summer against Norwich the previous weekend.“But we somehow have to find a way of getting some more runs on the board, because our batting performance on Saturday summed up the lack of confidence in our batters.

“It was all very disappointing. There were no positives to take, apart from the opening stand. It was a bad result, and whereas we weren’t helped by a few (umpiring) decisions that we felt went against us, rather than for us, it makes it harder when your batters are not in form.

“I don’t think it’s a lack of ability, it’s just poor application and not everyone being confident of playing at this level.”

Put into bat by Granta captain, Jonathan Atkinson, Bury began well with openers Ben Curran and Dominic Manthorpe putting on 86 for the first wicket. The young duo batted patiently, until Curran was bowled by Owen Simonsen for 52, accrued off 117 balls.

Alas, Curran’s departure prompted a big collapse. Manthorpe followed quickly, caught by wicketkeeper Michael Pepper off spinner Lewys Hill for 37, compiled off 90 balls.

Simonsen (17-8-28-4) and Hill (18-5-36-4) then ran through the visitors’ batting order, Simonsen claiming the vital wicket of West Indian all-rounder Daron Cruickshank (9), caught in the deep, and also that of captain Park, who was trapped leg before.

Douglas Rice then took centre stage, in Cambridge’s reply, thumping a terrific 71 off just 64 balls, including a six and 11 fours.

Rice dominated an opening stand of 87 with Ben Claydon (31 not out), who then added an unbeaten 52 for the second wicket with Pepper.