HALSTEAD Cricket Club captain Josh Wells believes their win at Ipswich demonstrates the growing positive mentality of his team.

A 92-run victory consolidated Halstead’s third position in the Marshall Hatchick Two Counties Championship division one.

Half-centuries for Chris Huntington and Wells paved the way for what turned into a comfortable win for the visitors, but it was one they may have struggled to close out in previous years.

Wells said: “Where we are now is with a different mentality.

“At tea, we realised we didn’t have as many runs on the board as we perhaps should have, but we had a belief that we could win.

“Before, there may have been a few doubts, but not now.

“We are in a good place.

“It will be nice to win the next few games and see where we end up.

“There are some hard games coming up, but we are feeling confident.”

That next game for Halstead will be against Mistley at Star Stile on Saturday when Wells said he expected there to be an unchanged side for the hosts. They will be looking to build on another strong performance at Ipswich.

In a game shortened to 45 overs, Wells won the toss and elected to bat first. As has become the norm this year, Huntington got off to a blistering start, dominating the 74-run opening stand with Harry Pritchard (17), racing to 40 from 23 balls after four overs.

The left-handed opener reached his 50 off 33 balls but was caught and bowled in the 12th over for 59.

Wells promoted himself to number three and picked up where Huntington had left off, moving the score into three figures as he and Pritchard accumulated effectively.

Pritchard was the next man to depart, while Josh Ruthven made six and Charlie Douglas-Hughes was caught behind without scoring, but Wells passed his half-century, batting with Craig Spooner (25), and moved on to 57 before he was caught, sparking a batting collapse.

Sam Chapman (11) was the only other batsman to reach double-figures as havoc was wrought on the Halstead lower-middle order and they were bowled out for 202 in the 44th over.

Wells added: “We came off at tea wondering if we had enough runs on the board.

“The outfield was lightning quick and if a batsman got in, then he would have a chance, but I was pleased to see that we never let them get started and that’s the difference I think we are seeing this year.”

Spooner’s made an early breakthrough with a wicket with the first ball of the second over, but Joe Rusby (21), Mark Burch (36) and Damien Smith (24) all got starts for the hosts as they moved on to 47 for one from ten overs.

The introduction of Joe Morris and Josh King helped turn the game massively in the visitors’ favour, though.

Morris has not been in the wickets this year, but produced a fine spell of three for 18 from ten overs, bowling his allocation straight through to great success.

Rusby and Burch were both out caught behind by Sam Chapman, with Ipswich 84 for three after 20 overs.

Three wickets then fell without the addition of any runs as Ipswich went from 92 for three to 92 for six.

Andrew Charlton (2-8) picked up two wickets in the final overs of the Ipswich innings as Nicholas Johnson (5) picked out Spooner at cow corner and Matthew Porter (1) was trapped lbw.

King collected his fourth wicket of the game to finish things off as Halstead wrapped up a 92-run victory.