North London are finally off the mark for the season in Division Three after Will Lake’s breezy 47 not out sealed a six-wicket victory over Winchmore Hill.

NL bowled their visitors out for just 136, with Tom Wakeford returning figures of 3-33 and spin duo Ted Greally and Jordan Gregory taking two wickets apiece.

Despite a couple of scares in their reply, Lake’s innings steered North London over the line at the start of the 28th over to clinch their first win of the campaign.

“It was good to get on the board – it felt like it had been a lot longer!” said NL captain Sam Bardon. “But I felt we’d been getting closer in the last couple of weeks, with some promising performances.

“It was a standard North London wicket, with something in it for both seamers and spinners. Tom did very well with the new ball and then the spinners kept the pressure on.

“Hussain Shabbir and Alan O’Shea managed to blunt their opening bowler and set us up into a good position and, although we had a little wobble, Will quickly corrected it.

“As always in this league, you can climb the table quickly and, provided we play like we did on Saturday, there’s no reason that can’t happen.”

Wakeford removed the first three Winchmore Hill batsmen – Morgan Prior (14), Chris Chapman (15) and Jim Gatting (13) – with Bardon (1-30) dismissing his opposite number Del Terblanche for a duck.

Alex Greig (30) and Siran Seevaratnam (39) bolstered the lower middle order, but Greally (2-26) and Gregory (2-20) ensured that Winchmore Hill were shot out in the 35th over.

Fast bowler Scott Burkinshaw removed Gregory (9) early on, but Shabbir (26) and O’Shea (22) steadied the ship before two wickets went down in the same Gatting over.

However, Lake’s unbeaten 47 from 35 balls kept NL on track and, with the support of O’Shea and Jack Godfrey-Wood (9no), they cruised home at 137-4 with almost 18 overs to spare.