With that in mind the Bulldogs made sure they attempted to snare an outright win over South Warrandyte at Hughes Park on Saturday.

After resuming at 4-110, already past South Warrandyte's 97, the Bulldogs declared at 5-185, with Lee Stockdale (65) and Michael King (40 not out).

Batting a second time, South Warrandyte finished on 4-136, with Bulldogs captain-coach Josh Stewart happy his side could continue to keep hold of fourth place in an increasingly tight competition.

"We are pretty well aware about the ladder, the top four is so close so we have to keep winning," he said.

"Our bowlers set up the game on day one. I think we were lucky to catch South Warrandyte on a bad day. Their batsmen are better than making 97 and we saw that on day two. While we got them four down both captains could see the game wasn't going to progress any further."

Stewart said the Bulldogs had to take wins from their coming matches to keep ahead of the pack.

In the battle for top spot, Wantirna South took until the last over to overtake North Ringwood's 7-241. Andrew Jorgensen (97) and Matthew King (40) guided the Devils to 4-202 before a collapse of 5-28 saw Wantirna South still requiring 11 runs. Jason Walsh (21 not out) then held the Bulls' bowling at bay to see the Devils finish on 9-246.

Sam Ridgewell (3-44) had the best bowling figures for North Ringwood.

Wonga Park put relegation behind it with an easy win over Norwood.

In reply to Wonga's 213, Norwood's early batsmen succumbed to Stuart Dunk (4-27) and despite hands from Brendan O'Reilly (34) and Ben Hastie (30), the Vikings never recovered and were dismissed for 119. At 2-77, East Ringwood fancied its chances of chasing down Croydon North's 172. However, with the loss of Darren Hill (51), Mark Sacristani (4-9) with the help of three run outs saw the Roos crumble to be all out for 146. The Knights batted a second time, finishing on 1-39.

Chasing Mooroolbark's 8-244, Croydon Ranges was never in contention. After losing wickets at regular intervals throughout their innings, the Kookaburras were dismissed for 166, with Blake Smith (41) and Sean Humphrey (43) the only major contributors.

Jarrod Runge (4-64) took bowling honours for Mooroolbark.

Andy Wu (6-35) kept Warranwood's finals aspirations alive by running through Bayswater Park's batting line-up, to see it dismissed for 168 in reply to Warranwood's 240.