The historic county of Westmorland was stripped of its administrative powers in 1974, powers that were taken over by the new administrative county of Cumbria. Westmorland lives on as a historic county and its legacy is maintained by many organisations and businesses such as The Westmorland County Agricultural Show, The Westmorland County Football Association and as I reported last week, The Westmorland Cricket League. Coverage of the league is to be found in The Westmorland Gazette, a weekly newspaper founded in 1818. The excellent Mitchells' newsagent in Northallerton carries a range of newspapers with catchment areas outside North Yorkshire, and following my trip to 'Westmorland' last week I picked up a copy of The Gazette to investigate its cricket coverage.
The edition of July 25th had three pages of cricket reports, scores and tables. Most prominent is The Northern Cricket League whose teams include Leyland, Garstang, St Anne's and Barrow but the main focus was on local sides, Netherfield and Kendal. Kendal find themselves in a battle to avoid relegation, a situation not helped by a defeat at the hands of fellow strugglers St Anne's. 'Batting frailties haunt Kendal' sums it up nicely, 113 all out gives the cold facts. Netherfield are better placed, fifth in the table, but well behind leaders Leyland. Last Saturday's deluge has left the table unchanged.
Coverage of the Westmorland League is headed by the line 'Leaders are locked together after wins', the leaders being Westgate and Carnforth.. The league extends to four divisions and apart from these two teams sides include Arnside, Heysham and Cartmel . All 19 matches scheduled for last Saturday were abandoned without a ball being bowled so Carnforth and Westgate CC remain tied on 154 points with Milnthorpe just four points adrift. Silverdale and Holme occupy the relegation spots but Trimpell are only just squeak above the pink zone and demotion to Division two seems certain to be the fate of two of these three elevens. Milnthorpe v Carnforth seems to be the pick of this week's matches. The forecast for Saturday in the area suggests a decent day, let's hope the grounds can recover from the thunderstorms predicted for the interim period.
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