Steven Allen shines in home loss for Whitby Cricket Club 1sts against Norton

The visitors racked up 264-6 mainly thanks to centuries from openers Craig Symington (110no) and James Minto (103no), who shared a superb stand of 198.

Steven Allen pulled the hosts back into the game with an excellent 5-53.

In reply, the hosts never really locked like chasing down this score despite the trio of Joe Padmore (34), Aussie keeper-batsman Charlie Taylor (33) and Theo Clarke (25) all making solid starts.

Whitby were eventually dismissed for 148 in 41.1 overs.

Skipper Kai Morris said: “Saturday was obviously another disappointing result, but there were plenty of positives to take from it.

"Steve Allen bowled really to get five-fer and it was good to see lads like Padders (Joe Padmore), Theo and Charlie look in really good touch with the bat.

"Results haven’t gone our way so far this year but everyone’s working really hard and in my opinion we’ve played quite a bit of good cricket this year and then not quite got over the line.

"We’ve left ourselves with a big task to get out of the relegation zone but I really do think if we keep playing the way we have so far and just be a little better in the key moments we can get the results we need to turn our season around, starting at Thornaby this coming Saturday.”