KIDDERMINSTER Victoria played their part in a nail-biting draw with Birmingham and District League Premier Division rivals Himley on Saturday.

The Chester Road side earned 10 points after a dramatic end to the game.

Requiring one run to win the match, Himley skipper Stuart Wedge tried to hit the ball away from the fielders but failed to make contact, making the final result a rare draw.

It was the culmination of a hard-fought game between two evenly-matched sides.

KVCC were put into bat and lost their first wicket when Danny Smith bowled Andy Kimberlin for one run.

A super partnership of 133 between Worcestershire duo Matt Pardoe and Neil Pinner added some impetus.

Pardoe looked set for a century, but on 67 he was bowled by Ahmed Hussain.

Regrettably, the rest of the KVCC batting failed to support Pinner.

Apart from Richard Kimberlin who scored 13, no other batsman got into double figures.

The next biggest score came from 20 extras. There had been a possibility of a very big score, but Pinner had to restrain himself to make sure there was not a premature end to the innings.

The batsman had batted as well as he has all season, but with his century in sight, he was caught by Nathan Round off Nick Harrison’s bowling in the 52nd over. His 98 runs came off 142 balls and included nine fours.

The rest of the batsmen had poor games, with Ben Cox (3), Zac Turley (5), Connor Smith (0), Jonathan Wright (1), and Henry Wright (4), failing to make runs as KVCC ended on 219-9.

The visitors got off to a reasonable start with the ball when Round was caught by Jonathan Wright for 11.

As with the KVCC innings, there came a good partnership of 83 for the second wicket, which ended when Greg Wright was run out by a good piece of fielding by Pardoe.

The Himley batsman was out in the 26th over, and Himley came under pressure, only scoring only 37 runs in their next 13, losing three wickets in the process.

Rajat Bhattia, who played for IPL winners Kolkata Knight Riders earlier in the year, was caught in the slips by Connor Smith, bowled by Wright for 17.

Michael Jones had scored 34 when he was out to a good catch by Turley off the bowling of Pinner.

With the score on 142, Pinner took another wicket, Waqas Ahmed (4), with yet another great catch by Turley.

Himley recovered and took their score up to 206 by the 53rd over, but lost the wicket of Tom Kohler-Cadmore when he was bowled by Pardoe.

The experienced pair of Wedge and keeper Jag Dhillon had to bat out time for either a win or a losing draw.

With Wedge on 27 and Dhillon on seven, Pardoe bowled the final over. He conceded three runs of his first five balls leaving Himley’s skipper requiring a single off the last ball of the match which he failed to do.

Pinner took 2-50 from his 17 overs, with Pardoe taking 1-18, Wright 1045 and Kimberlin 1-43.

KVCC travel to Knowle and Dorridge next Saturday (noon start) in the league.