BILLERICAY ended Wickford’s unbeaten start to the season with an impressive six-wicket win.

Wickford were unbeaten ahead of the encounter, with two wins and a draw from their three games while Billericay were beaten last time out against Fives & Heronians to lose for the first time this season.

But it was Billericay that came out on top, with captain Dave Houghton scoring 102 not out.

The Australian’s innings was added to by Ross Poulton’s 61 not out and decent knocks from Dave Hinnigan (28), Lee Knight (33) and Christopher Tait (32).

And Houghton said his team needed a performance after ‘throwing away the result’ last weekend.

“It was a great result for us coming off the disappointment of last week where we were in a good position with the bat and threw it away.

“Personally, it was more of a relief to get a decent score. Billericay has done a lot for me ever since I've been here so I'm just looking to repay them this year with some good performances.

“Hopefully now we will be able to kick-start a good run of performances leading into the 50-over matches.”

But it was Wickford that made the good start, having chosen to bat first, with their own skipper John Pratt scoring 86.

Jona Sammut’s 78 and Dean Etchells’ 61 not out saw Wickford close on 272-5 before declaring.

Poulton claimed three wickets for 92 runs and ran out Charlie Phillippe, with Gary Hynes taking the other man.

Billericay got off to a wretched start when Stuart Hynes fell for a third-ball duck but the next five batsmen saw them home.

Jamie Went (2-41), Daniel Pryke (1-41) and Reece Pinchback (1-32) took the wickets.

Despite their defeat, Wickford did claim nine points for a fine batting display, which saw them fall just short.

Leigh-on-Sea were comfortably beaten by Harlow Town to fall to their first defeat of the season.

Dean Waller’s team managed only 125 in response to Harlow’s 221-8 in their innings, despite the hosts failure to win a game ahead of the encounter.

Having lost the toss, Leigh were put into field first and they struggled to make a breakthrough, with an opening stand of 89.

But Alan van Lint, who ended with fine figures of 6-74, took the first three men only for the middle order to add runs to the Harlow total.

In came Leigh but early quick-fire wickets saw Harlow take the initiative, with Nick van Lint (eight) add Jon Edwards (zero) falling with the score on 29.

Captain Dean Waller top scored with 34, with Joe Sexton (27) and Al Lawrence (21) the only other men to contribute meaningfully.

Stanford-le-Hope played their best match to date against county rivals Belhus but still came out on the losing side by three wickets.

Put into bat first, Michael Gray’s team reached 235 all out after 50.3 overs. Martin Leslie (66) and Thomas Willats (39) set the pace, with tail-enders Adam Knight (31) and Dylan Eginton (29) also contributing.

Connor Day, Danny Norris and Gary Sanderson took three wickets apiece for Belhus as they remain at the top of the standings.

In response, Michael Fogg’s 65 and Wayne Read’s 44 not out helped Belhus over the line, with Martin Guilbert (33) adding runs.

Eginton (3-61), Matthew Higgins (2-90) and Andrew Love (2-47) took the Belhus wickets.

Horndon on the Hill ran riot against Ardleigh Green to take a nine-wicket win.

Ardleigh elected to bat but could only muster 84 runs, with Connor Price taking the plaudits with figures of 6-32.

Chris Cook (52) was the only man to provide any resistance.

Jack Marson (2-26) and Ryan Madder (1-24) were the other wicket takers, with Stephen Edwards claiming a run-out.

Horndon lost Jack Walsh (19), but Connor Hammond’s 29 and Shahbaz Iqbal’s 30 saw them over the line to climb to sixth in the standings.