Shrewsbury are celebrating a Shropshire derby double after keeping their Birmingham League premier division title hopes alive with a nerve-jangling victory over Wellington.

The battle between Shropshire’s two top sides at Orleton Park came down to the very final over with Shrewsbury requiring eight runs to reach their victory target of 199.

And a tense finale went the way of the visitors when Steve Barnard hit Mark Downes for six off the third last ball.

“It wasn’t a great performance and we gave them at least 30 runs through bad fielding, but we are pleased with the win,” said captain Ed Foster.

Batting first, Wellington recovered from 87-4 to post 199-9 off their 55 overs, Mark Downes and Wendell Wagner hitting 37 and 34 respectively.

Rob Foster led the way for Shrewsbury with 6-44 while Elliott Green took the remaining three wickets.

Shrewsbury lost Ryan Bishop cheaply but an 86-run partnership between Ed Foster (52) and Will Parton (48) put the visitors on top at 103-1.

Wellington, however, refused to throw in the towel and were kept in contention by 4-42 for Adam Byram.

But 31 from Tom Cox tipped the balance back in Shrewsbury’s favour before Barnard’s late heroics.

“It was a terrific game of cricket,” said Wellington manager Terry O’Connor.

“We felt we should have got 20 or 30 more runs but we couldn’t have done a lot more in the field.”

Shifnal suffered a second successive Bank Holiday defeat as they were beaten by four wickets at home to Dorridge in division one after being dismissed for 164.

Oswestry maintained a 22 point advantage over the relegation zone in division three – despite a four-wicket home defeat to Lichfield.

The Morda Road men posted their highest total of the season of 241-5. Young Joe Carrasco top scored with 88 while Dean Suter finished unbeaten on 67 and Alex Huxley made 43.

But Lichfield got home with one over to spare thanks to a rapid 108 from opener Dean Price.

By JAMES GARRISON