YORKSHIRE'S Specsavers County Championship title challenge is hanging by a thread after a 179-run defeat to lowly Somerset at Scarborough today.

The white rose county's third loss in nine matches, and their second in the last three, came on the back of their failure to chase 337 in a minimum of 90 overs on the final day, handing Somerset a first win of the campaign.

They slipped to 12-3, losing Alex Lees, Harry Brook and Peter Handscomb for ducks, and never recovered to be bowled out for 157 inside 39 overs midway through the afternoon.

Yorkshire, bowled out for 213 in the first innings, claimed only four points from this fixture and now sit 38 behind leaders Essex with only five to play.

Essex have six remaining, including Yorkshire at Scarborough early next month and Chelmsford in the season's final game in September, which is a silver lining for coach Andrew Gale and co.

But, in truth, Yorkshire look a long way from being genuine title contenders, with their top-order batting a particular concern.

Gale has some interesting decisions to make when Essex visit for Festival Week, starting on August 6.

"We weren't up to scratch, nowhere near," said Gale, who was disappointed with the batting in general and had sympathy for his depleted bowling unit.

"It hasn't been a good couple of weeks.

"We didn't perform well at Lord's and weren't great at home against Surrey. Coming into this game, we wanted to put that right, but we haven't been at our best.

"I don't like talking about luck, but I captained the club for seven years and didn't lose two quick bowlers in one game (Ryan Sidebottom and Liam Plunkett).

"It was tough for Tim Bresnan to manoeuvre the bowlers.

"We've spoken at length about the batting for a long time now, and I think it's gone past the point of speaking about it. It's about doing it now.

"We've done a lot of talking in the dressing room about what we need to do."

The excellent Craig Overton claimed four wickets in the second innings to finish with career- best match figures of 9-134.

James Hildreth had earlier gone from 85 to 101 not out as 47 runs came in the first 4.3 overs of play before the declaration on 281-4.

Plunkett, batting with Adam Lyth as his runner due to his groin injury, hit an innings top-score of 39 with three sixes, and his stand of 37 for the ninth wicket with Ben Coad was also the best of the innings.

Plunkett will have a scan tomorrow to assess the damage.

He will miss the opening stages of Yorkshire's NatWest T20 Blast campaign as a result, with Gale admitting: "It doesn't look good."

Ryan Sidebottom's back/side injury will also be scanned, alongside 18-year-old batsman Harry Brook, who suffered a suspected broken right hand batting in the nets before play.

He was caught behind for a nine-ball duck following a brute of a short ball from Overton.

"The break from Championship cricket has probably come at a good time for us," added Gale.

"Twenty20's about enjoyment and having fun, putting on a good show. It can free players up.

"We've been here before with bad periods in Yorkshire cricket. It can change very fast. In three or four weeks, we can turn this on its head."