North Enfield earned a combative draw against second placed Bishop's Stortford Seconds in Herts Division Two B.

Batting first the home side used all 53 overs to reach 254-6 as their innings got off to a shaky start with opening bowler Derrick Sanders (4-83) removing opener Stuart Felstead for a 13-ball duck.

But from there Stortford rebuilt well and safe in the knowledge that they had plenty of batting to come, played their shots throughout.

North Enfield looked to wrestle back control, taking two wickets in quick succession reducing the home side to 65-3 after 17 overs, but once again Stortford played their way out of a hole, targeting the shorter boundary.

Sanders returned to take two wickets, leaving the home side on 133-5, but this brought Damian Westwood to the crease who played a powerful innings until Sanders bowled him for 47 from 58 balls.

Chasing down a total of 254 in 47 overs would always have been a tough ask for Enfield, but it was made even harder when they were reduced to 38-3 after nine overs.

From that point the win was never on the cards and with some serious rebuilding to do to reach the runs required for batting bonus points, Captain Kieran Jones (72 not out) and Andy Pearson (30) put on a vital 76-run partnership.

When Pearson was removed by Alex Palmer with the score on 130 in the 36th over, Khalid Abubaker (11 not out) came to the crease and dutifully picked up where Pearson left off rotating the strike and together with Jones saw the side to 179 from 47 overs.

The draw leaves North Enfield in eighth place in the league with only 13 points separating five teams.

North Enfield Seconds slipped to a narrow defeat at home in Division 6B against Eversholt Seconds.

The visitors won the toss and elected to bat first on what was to be a good batting wicket, reaching 222-2 before they declared after 46 overs.

This sporting declaration set up a good game as North Enfield went about chasing the target down.

A quickfire 50 from Darren Atkins promoted up the order to number three got Enfield off to a good start and runs in the middle order from Garry Orton (35) and Mark Partridge helped the Home side towards the total.

But Eversholt's bowlers kept taking wickets at crucial times and eventually took the tenth wicket with just two balls to spare with the score on 181.