Unbeaten Streak Ends

In a game dubbed by a few as the biggest of the season so far Arbroath made the trip to Mannofield to take on the Champions.

Buchan again won the toss and decided to bat first on a flat wicket, hoping to avoid the standard Manno-collapse shown against Arbroath in recent years.

Howard was first to depart, with the score on 5, driving loosely to point. Van Der Berg, accustomed to being at the crease early helped take the score to 30 in partnership with Chris Venske before being stumped off the left arm spin of Ramsey for 5.

Venske and aspiring music artist Cooray added exactly 50 in decent time, with both men finding the boundary regularly and looking in good touch.

With the score on 80, Cooray's stumps were rearranged by a good delivery from Willemse for 30 and again Arbroath squeezed a wicket when a partnership was building.

With Tomlinson the new man to the crease and Venske well set after passing his first half century of the season the pair rotated the strike well and blunted the spin attack from Arbroath in adding 86 before Tomlinson (38) was out caught.

Chris Venske was next to go, lbw to Ford for 93. A return to form for the South African and a innings at a slower pace than usual showing good determination to stick it out when required through some good bowling spells.

A typically quickfire 16 from keeper Reid and short cameos from Martin, Critchley and Halcrow working hard at rotating the strike but a lack of boundaries in the final overs took the home side to an under par total of 223 for 8 from their allotted overs.

In reply, Ford was dismissed lbw to Buchan for 5 with only 8 on the board but wickets proved elusive for the Mannofield men as a couple of close calls and opportunities went begging.

With the score on 62, Halcrow in the middle of a solid spell knocked over opener McLean with a delivery surely clocking into the high 50's.

Unfortunately the runs kept flowing from the bat of Burnett, who in turn with Willemse added 157 with relative ease.

Cooray finally picked up Burnett for a match winning 121, caught by Howard with only 5 runs to win.

The final 5 runs were knocked off inside the 46th over only 3 wickets down.

Every bowler used did well to contain the Arbroath reply and kept the total to a run a ball right down until the last 10 overs but ultimately the team as a whole couldn't put together the complete performance to get over the line.

'Shire now travel to unbeaten Carlton on Saturday.