Dukes ECB Regional Nortrh-East Premier League

NORTON celebrated their first win of the season to bring an end to a run of four defeats in their first five games and produce the first signs they might escape from the lower reaches of the division.

But on a couple of occasions in their game with Newcastle they had to wonder if they had thrown away their big chance.

Firstly, after taking eight wickets relatively cheaply they allowed the Tynesiders to recover, with the highlight being a remarkable last wicket partnership. When they started their reply they lost their first two wickets for six runs.

The sensational Newcastle revival from their No 10 and 11 batsmen involved Nick Harrison (78 not out) and Paul Lindsay (40) who took the visitors’ score to an unlikely 211 after excellent bowling from Ben Duncan (4- 30) and Ken Gresham (4-41) had put Norton soundly on top.

Norton’s response to their early loss of wickets was led by Matthew Brown, who made 70, and Matthew Thomas who backed him with 67.

A steady unbeaten 27 by Dean Williams, batting at No 7, saw Norton safely through as they went on to win by three wickets.

Norton moved on to 48 points leaving near neighbours Stockton even more isolated at the bottom of the table. They are 21 points adrift after losing for a fifth time when hosting South Shields.

Karl Turner (43) did his best to inspire the Teessiders after Chris Hooker (3-32) and Malintha Gajanayake (3-56) confined Shields to a fairly modest 162. Oliver Stedman (36) was top scorer for the visitors but they had match winners in their bowling duo of Nicholas Quinn (3-20) and Kris McShane (3-33).

McShane bowled six maidens in his 14-over spell and Shields, who won by 22 runs, stay fourth in the ratings.

Chester-le-Street kept up their pursuit of leaders South Northumberland with an impressive victory over Gateshead Fell. Luke Evans (4-37) took out three of the top four Fell batsmen with Andrew Bell (3-27) and Andrew Smith (2-8) finishing off their innings at 165.

Cestrians’ openers, Simon Birtwistle (62 not out) and Alan Mustard (62) gave the visitors an excellent start to their reply and with Smith adding an unbeaten 34 they romped home by nine wickets.

Blaydon grabbed the bigger share of the points in a nail-biting drawn finish with Durham Academy, with only two runs between the teams at the finish.

Altogether 524 runs were scored with Craig Knox making an unbeaten 101 out of 263-5 for Blaydon, and half centuries for Ben Raine and Ryan Pringle in the Academy’s reply of 261-7.

Sunderland went down unexpectedly to Benwell Hill who are now just three points behind them in sixth place.

Zohaib Khan (44 not out and 4-58 in 17 overs) was the all-round match winner, but there were notable contributions for Benwell from Mark Dale (55) and Phil Nicholson (46).

Leaders South North chalked up their sixth win in six games by overpowering Tynemouth.