North Walsham Town 3, Cromer Town 0: The new Premier Division season for Cromer started with an away trip to local rivals North Walsham. New signings Richard Kellett, Daniel Cullington and Liam Landamore (all North Walsham) and Gavin Neale (Holt) all made their first league start for the Crabs.

North Walsham Town 3, Cromer Town 0

THE new Premier Division season for Cromer started with an away trip to local rivals North Walsham. New signings Richard Kellett, Daniel Cullington and Liam Landamore (all North Walsham) and Gavin Neale (Holt) all made their first league start for the Crabs. Also under 18 player Sam Applegate partnered Darren Terrington in attack, writes Richard Cox.

It was the home side who made the better start. The ball was played in behind the Cromer defence to Alex Fitzgerald. He was one-on-one with Kellett who kept out his first attempt but the ball went back to Fitzgerald who under very little pressure scored the opening goal to give North Walsham the lead. Then Robert Grand saw his effort headed off the line by Landamore before Fitzgerald's shot was blocked. On the half hour mark North Walsham extended their lead thanks to a composed finish in the bottom corner from James Clifton.

Before half time the visitors had a couple of chances to pull a goal back but Cullington and Terrington were both off target with their headers and the home side went in at the break with a deserved lead.

Cromer made the worst possible start to the second half conceding a third just two minutes in. A poor defensive line allowed the hosts to get down the right-wing and a cross came into the box and the ball was bravely headed into the goal by Adam Bunton.

This more or less secured the points for North Walsham because Cromer up to now had very rarely threatened so the game needed to change dramatically for the Crabs to get anything from the match.

The game didn't change and it was North Walsham who looked more likely to extend their advantage. Andrew Hanby volleyed across the face of goal and Clifton was only denied thanks to an excellent tackle from Liam Davies inside the box. Their final chance went to David Hinton but his effort was saved by Kellett.

A far from ideal start to the season for Cromer but they can have no arguments with the result and they will just have to hope it's a minor blip in the season as they hope to be challenging for honours.

The Reserves made a winning start to their campaign in Division Three with a 1-0 victory at home to Easton. Gavin Sheridan got the goal.