Cricket's a funny old game as Yorkshire found out to their benefit against Leicestershire at Scarborough yesterday.

Shortly after Colin Graves and Martyn Moxon had explained Ajmal Shahzad's departure, the man who replaced him in the side helped to put them on course for a first County Championship win of 2012.

Anthony McGrath, who should have been captaining the seconds at Lytham this week, wheeled away from the Trafalgar Square End at North Marine Road to return impressive figures of 4-21 from 12.2 overs as the visitors, replying to 447, were bowled out for 116.

McGrath's haul not only allowed Andrew Gale to enforce the follow-on, it also meant the former England international took the new ball before close with his accurate medium pace.

He did not strike again, but saw Steve Patterson trap Greg Smith lbw with the day's last ball.

Leicester closed on 3-1 after two overs of their second innings, and they will resume this morning 328 runs adrift and staring down the barrel of a three-day defeat.

Yorkshire could, and probably should, have got more than 447 as they struggled for rhythm before lunch, but they still have more than enough runs in the tank thanks to Jonny Bairstow's 182 and McGrath's 90.

Discipline was Yorkshire's buzz word yesterday in bitterly cold conditions, which forced players from both sides to field in wooly hats and, no doubt, with hand warmers in their pockets.

Ryan Sidebottom bowled five maidens in his opening seven-over spell, which yielded the wickets of Matt Boyce lbw and Jacques Du Toit caught behind to leave the score at 12-2.

Smith was caught behind off Patterson to make it 12-3 before McGrath's second ball accounted for ex-West Indies Test captain Ramnaresh Sarwan, also trapped lbw.

Wickets continued to fall at pace as McGrath removed Ned Eckersley lbw and had Josh Cobb (29) caught behind after a wild swish shortly after tea.

Patterson, who snared Wayne White lbw, then had Robbie Joseph caught behind to clinch the 100th first-class wicket of his career, leaving the score at 68-8 in the 38th over.

Leicestershire enjoyed their best period with the bat as ninth-wicket pair Claude Henderson and Nadeem Malik added 36 in a little over eleven overs, profiting from the odd edge wide of the slip cordon.

But, while Yorkshire have been undone by frustrating tail-end partnerships on numerous occasions in the last few seasons, this was nothing other than delaying the inevitable.

Tim Bresnan had Henderson caught at third slip by Phil Jaques, who did the same to get rid of Alex Wyatt off McGrath's bowling shortly afterwards.