Whitby CC skipper Kai Morris aiming for a strong second half of NYSD League season
Whitby Cricket Club first-team skipper Kai Morris is happy with his side’s progress after a sluggish start to the NYSD League Division 2 campaign and hopes they can push further up the table in the second half of the season.
The batsman was also quick to hail the impact that new recruits, and former Mulgrave CC stars, Chris Knight and Craig Thompson, had made on the team, with a win and two draws in their last three games seeing them edge clear of the relegation zone.
Morris said: “Ultimately we’d like to be further up the table but we’re improving all the time after a poor start to the season.
“It’s all coming together and it’s been particularly pleasing to see how Chris Knight and Craig Thompson have fitted into the side.
"Hopefully they both go on to have a big second half of the season.
"The goal for the rest of the season is to continue improving and keep getting better, hopefully we can keep moving up the table and we’ll see where we’re at with three or four games to go.
"We’ve also got the Hundred starting soon which we want to go deep into and hopefully bring home some silverware."
Looking back at Saturday’s draw at home to leaders Rockliffe Park, Morris, who struck 30 not out, was happy with the team’s display despite missing out the win.
He added: “While it was disappointing again to not get the win on Saturday, at the same time it was another decent performance with many positives. Obviously with them scoring over 300 we didn’t bowl as well as we’d liked but everyone stuck to the task well and and kept going.
“Mike (Thompson) was excellent again, particularly in his first spell when he really brought us back into the game they got a bit of a flyer. Mike’s bowled well all season and not really got the rewards so for him to get five wickets was really pleasing.
"We batted really well, which has been the case over the last few weeks.
“Chris Knight played really nicely up front and then Rhys (Buck) and Woody (Andy Wood) kept it going through the middle and right up until we lost Rhys we were still looking to win the game but ultimately we had to settle for a 90% draw.
"Credit to young Jack as well on debut who played a good hand and stuck with me for a while to make sure we got to 90%.”