Rio May joined Whitby Town in July 2016 from Northern League side Guisborough Town, following Chris Hardy to the club for his first full season.

May made his debut on the opening day of the 2016/17 season in the 1-1 draw at Sutton Coldfield Town, going on to miss only five games that season and making 51 appearances as the Seasiders won the North Riding Senior Cup and narrowly missed out on the play-offs.

The following campaign, May found himself in and out of the first team, making 36 appearances, one as a sub, as the Blues made a poor start to the season.

The defender left the club in May 2018, signing for Marske United in the Northern Premier League Division One East after making 87 appearances for the club.

I’d known Chardy from our time at Guisborough. When he got the job at Whitby I was hoping I’d be one of the players he’d take with him. Fortunately, at the start of the following season, I was. I got the sense straight away that it was a family club, with passionate people involved in and around it.

Most of my favourite memories definitely occurred in my first season. Beating eventual champions Blyth Spartans on Boxing Day whilst my nephew was mascot was nice. However, my favourite has got to be winning the North Riding Senior Cup at the Riverside as it’s always nice to get silverware to bring an end to a positive season.

I definitely look back with fond memories. Like I say, I met some lovely people there and in particular, that first season was a successful one.

Looking at the present day, the early season end was very disappointing. I’m sure everybody who loves football feels the same. With Marske, I felt we had a good run of fixtures to cement a play-off place and gather some momentum going into them. However as much as it pains me to say, it was probably the right decision to cut the season short.