Now they have to play the waiting game.

With a bye in the upcoming last round of the regular season Redbacks needed a win to keep their hopes of a top three finish alive.

Bathurst City needed some of their best bowling of the season to keep Rugby short of the 259 target on a batting-friendly George Park 1 deck.

They got it through an attack led by Ben Orme's 3-39 off 20 overs. 

He was well supported by William Wright's 2-27, Dene Rice's 2-32 and Aditya Adey's economical 1-7.

Rugby had a big team effort of their own during the chase, with no standout partnership but plenty of contributions throughout the order.

Chris Albon (62) continued to chip away at the target after fellow opener Imran Qureshi (6) departed early. 

Albon was assisted by Scott Johnston (20) and Tyler Horton (39) during an encouraging first two sessions with the bat.

Rugby captain Sam Macpherson (25) and Oliver Newton (29) injected some spark back into the Rugby chase 

Newton's dismissal left the score at 7-210 and it was wickets - not time - that became Rugby's concern.

It only seemed appropriate that Orme, who had claimed the opening scalp of Qureshi, picked up the winning wicket when he had Brendan Pallier trapped in front.

"Our bowlers were great. Ormey was at his best. He's probably been lacking a little intensity over the season but he's been putting in the work and it showed on the weekend," Coughlan said.

"He was fast and getting the ball to do a lot on a pretty flat pitch." 

The dream for Coughlan and his side was obviously an outright win but the captain couldn't be disappointed with how the day played out.

"It's one of those games where hindsight comes into it. You think 'Oh it's lucky we didn't declare at 220, it wouldn't have been enough' but then we might have taken a couple of early wickets and been right on top. You don't know what's going to happen," he said.

"I'm very happy with the win. We knew what we needed to go to make them follow on, which was 182 runs, but to their credit they batted really well.

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"Alby was great at the top and Tyler Horton played aggressively and helped them get away a bit in the middle of the day."

Bathurst City also had time to bring in some extra points from a short second innings.

Adey (14 not out), Coughlan (15) and Clint Moxon (11 not out) all made appearances at the crease.

McKinnon (1-21) picked up the sole wicket for Rugby.

After beating Rugby Redbacks now have to hope City Colts inflict the same result on the blue and gold boys next round.

Should Colts manage to do that then Redbacks are guaranteed to remain inside the top three while Rugby would miss out on the chance to defend their title.

Rugby have now slipped from first to fourth in the space of two matches, demonstrating how tightly contested the top four race has been.