HARLOW Town 1st XI’s good form ended with a huge bump after a bruising defeat by second placed, and new league leaders Stanford-le-Hope.

Struggling with availability issues throughout the club Harlow Town still put out a strong team hoping to maintain top place in the league however they were brutally put to the sword by the visitors.

The visitors won the toss and chose to bat but Town started superbly taking the wicket of the opener with the fourth ball of the day with Taylor Wood taking the catch off Sam Wilson’s bowling, however this was as good as it got for Town.

The visitors were ruthless in putting away any poor ball from the home bowlers, not to say they didn’t bat well and frequently played shots dissecting the bewildered Town fielders. Town were not able to get a wicket until Sam Wilson broke the 192 run stand as he returned for his second spell in the 26th over.

The visitors continued to score relatively freely as they picked up a lot of 2’s as Town struggled to stem the relentless tide of runs.

As the total cleared 250 one of the visiting batters inexplicably run himself out celebrating his 50 while the ball was still in play, and not long later Willats was caught by Sam Wilson off the bowling of Ausman Ginai for 132. Not long later the visitors declared having compiled a hefty 306/4 from 42.3 overs meaning that Town received 52 overs back to reach this target.

After a delicious tea, Harlow Town batters Dan Baldwin and Shaun Alderson were ready to lead the charge in chasing down the total. However, both were back in the hutch without troubling the scorer, with Darryl Pettengell also following shortly afterwards with Town 3-3 from 4 overs and staring an absolute annihilation squarely in the face.

Ben Tyne and Pat Yates were both out with less than 10 overs faced and just 17 on the scoreboard.

Joe Spiers and Scott Alderson offered a brief respite in the loss of wickets spending some good time at the crease, before Spiers was out LBW. Alderson continued to dig in but unfortunately the remaining batsman could not support him with Town eventually all out for 53 and suffering a 253 run loss.

Things could have been worse for Town, however the hard earned results so far this season sees Town remain in second place although they are now under pressure from the chasing pack.

Next week Town travel to Bentley CC who come off the back of two decent victories, so Town will need get back on track as soon as possible and try to reclaim top spot at the halfway point of the season.