DINGS suffered their fourth straight defeat, falling to a three-tries to two defeat at Birmingham. The home side showed great spirit and tenacity and deserved their 10-point victory, but it was another frustrating afternoon for the visitors, who huffed and puffed but never really got going.

Crusaders struggled at the set piece and were unable to come to terms with the referees interpretations, especially at the breakdown, and as a result gave away a staggering amount of penalties which proved costly.

There were pluses, though, with centre Marcus Brooker impressing In midfield after returning to the side after a lengthy lay-off, while Elize Ehizode carried strongly throughout and was the pick of the Dings pack.

The home side got off to a dream start and opened the scoring inside two-minutes with a try in the corner from wing Luke Smith, after No 8 Umraan Jadwat made the initial break. Scrum-half Jack Jolly added the extras from the touch line to open up a 7-0 lead.

Crusaders hit back seven-minutes later with a penalty from fly-half Sam Perry, but Jolly cancelled it out with his three-pointer shortly after. Dings came alive midway through the half and put together some dynamic phases, with flanker Tom Knight bursting through, selling an outrageous dummy before dotting down beneath the uprights. Perry's attempted conversion from in front was charged down and the scores remained 10-8 to the Bees.

But the home side went into the break holding a 17-8 advantage after flanker Danny Wright went over for a try converted by Jolly on 39 minutes. The second-half proved frustrating for the visitors. When they did manage to hold onto the ball for phases they caused Bees all sorts of problems. But it was the home side who got the first score of the second-half when Jadwat muscled over from a five-metre scrum. Jolly again added the extras to open up a 22-8 lead on the hour mark.

Dings battled back with a well worked try finished off my replacement wing Josh Trinham, and Steve Plummer"s conversion brought the visitors back in bonus-point territory at 22-15. But a later penalty from Jolly ensured Dings ended the game empty-handed for the fourth game in a row.