Hornchurch captain Billy Gordon insists his side must keep going to remain in the Shepherd Neame Essex League Premier Gooch Division title race.

Romford Recorder: Ollie Ekers of Shenfield during Harold Wood CC vs Shenfield CC (batting), Essex Cricket League Cricket at Harold Wood Park on 25th July 2020Ollie Ekers of Shenfield during Harold Wood CC vs Shenfield CC (batting), Essex Cricket League Cricket at Harold Wood Park on 25th July 2020 (Image: ©TGS Photo tgsphoto.co.uk +44 1376 553468)

The Harrow Lodge outfit are heading to Chelmsford Road to take on Shenfield on Saturday as they look to build on a seven-run victory over Hutton.

Skipper Gordon is looking forward to the clash and coming up against former team-mate Mehad Khan who has reportedly signed for Shenfield.

“We’ve just got to keep worrying about ourselves and keep getting results then go from there. Shenfield is going to be a difficult one, they’ve got some really good players,” Gordon said.

“I think they’ve got one of our old boys Mehad Khan, who has joined them. It’ll be good to play against him, but I just hope he has a bad game,” he chuckled.

“We’ve got to keep going and then by the end of the nine games if we’re up the top then that would be lovely. Shenfield is always a tough game, though.”

Hornchurch scored 209-7 after Gordon won the toss with Ronnie Saunders (70) top-scoring and Hutton came up short on 202-5, with the wickets shared between Shane Barwick, Gordon and Marc Whitlock.

“It was a good result for us in the end, we made it hard for ourselves again, but the important thing was we won,” said Gordon.

“I didn’t really know too much about Hutton to be honest, not really ever played against them much, but I was quite impressed by a lot of their younger players they’ve got coming through.

“Give them a year or two, they will be a really good side, so it ended up being a tough game.”

Gordon praised batsman Saunders but believes the bowling efforts were still not up to scratch.

“Ronnie batted brilliant, he has been for a while, but Saturday was a bit different as the bowling was good and he had to stay in and it took a bit longer than normal for him,” he added. “Sometimes you’ve got to bat like that, he batted well, and a few others chipped in so it wasn’t too bad.”

He added: “Once again the first 20 overs weren’t good enough, too many wides and extras, and the fielding was a bit slack.

“We’ve spoke about that again so hopefully that will improve, but to be fair the ball wasn’t doing too much, the spinners come on and brought it back well for us.

“I think it was experience in the end that won us the game as they were ahead at one stage and our experience I think got us over the line.”