Northern Cricket Society

Posted by Tony Hutton

Tuesday 12th October 2010

The first meeting of the winter season took place in the Long Room at Headingley, once someone had managed to find the keys. Before the meeting all the members stood for a minutes silence in memory of John Ellison, a long standing and popular member of the Society, who died recently.

The annual general meeting re-elected all the existing officers for the coming year, with the proviso that the long serving secretary and treasurer, Harry Jackson and John Rex will be retiring at the end of the year. Any possible candidates will be welcomed with open arms and will hopefully receive 'on the job' training during the current session.

Our speaker's programme got off to an excellent start. The Reverend Canon Alan Haydock, who is a member of the Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club committee, was an unknown quantity to most of his audience. However his very humorous talk ranging from his schooldays to his present position as Honarary Canon of Southwell Minster kept us all royally entertained. His stories took in experiences such as keeping wicket in league cricket and diocesan matches in the Church Times cup, working in some of the less salubrious areas of Nottinghamshire and his support of Notinghamshire county cricket and Notts County football club.

John Rex, in his excellent vote of thanks, revealed that Canon Haydock has over many years donated more then £50,000 to various church and sporting charities from his speaking fees.

The next meeting will be in the Headingley Long Room on Tuesday 2nd November at 7.45 p.m., when the speaker will be Ismail Dawood, former Yorkshire wicketkeeper and now hoping to become a first class umpire.