Halstead Cricket Club captain Josh Wells says he is seeing improvements in all departments of his team this year in the opening stages of the Marshall Hatchick Two Counties Championship season.

The Star Stile club may not have been able to back up their opening win against Frinton with a victory against a big-hitting Witham side last weekend, but Wells feels there has been definite progress from his players over the last 12 months.

And he is looking for another good show when they head to Hadleigh in division one tomorrow.

He said: Overall, I think the team is looking a good 10 per cent better than last year.

“We are seeing better commitment from the players as availability has been good, Larvet [Masunda], our overseas player is looking good and we’ve still got a few players to come back.

“Oli Grayson has been in Australia but he’s back now for the rest of the year and we’re expecting good things from him after a summer down there. He’ll open the batting at Hadleigh tomorrow.

“So it’s all looking very positive and I think we’re in a much better position than we were at the same stage in the season last year.”

Wells said Grayson would come into the firsts, with Matt Cooper moving back into the seconds along with Sam Walter, as Chris Roper also returns to the division one team.

Halstead will be looking to bounce back from their defeat by Witham when they head to Hadleigh.

It was an eight-wicket win for Witham as Halstead were restricted to 173 for nine at Star Stile before the visitors made it to their target with just two wickets down.

However, while it looked a comprehensive defeat on paper, Wells said it was closer than that and may have been closer still had chances been taken at important times in the game.

He added: “It looks pretty convincing on their behalf, but to be honest, we weren’t really outplayed.

“We didn’t bat great, but the bowling was OK and we created chances.

“However, a couple were dropped early on and heads went down a bit after that happened.

“That was a shame and I’m not saying we’d have won had it not happened, but it would have been a lot closer.

“You can’t afford to give teams those chances in this division and that’s the case for all teams, not just Witham, as they all have a few players who will hurt you if you let them.

“There were still plenty of positives, though, and the boys weren’t too downbeat by the result.

“The bowling is looking good and that was shown by the chances that we did create against Witham.”