Entertaining Andrew

By Brian Sanderson,

It was good to hear from Tony and I wish him all the best.From Wednesday until Sunday I have been with Andrew Wickham watching cricket.Andrew lives in London but was born in Harrogate.He decided to come up last week to watch Yorkshire Seconds against Ireland A. instead of going to Scarborough.He will be going to Scarborough in August.

Wednesday,Ireland A won the toss and decided to bat.The sun was shining but there was another cold wind.The new pavilion barely finished and we were able to watch the laying of the grass in front of it .They reached 260 before the innings ended shortly before 4pm.No partnership bettered the eighth at 58 , wicket keeper Rory McCann was unbeaten at 40.The best bowling figures came from Moin Ashraf who took 3-44. Wardlaw looked fast and the slip fielders struggled to catch the ball of him due to his speed.
We saw Sayers caught on the boundary of his first ball.
So we moved off to see two matchs in the Wensleydale Evening League.We had lunch at the pub at Thornton-Watlass who were playing Eryholme.There are a number of trees in the field which caused the ball to strike them by the home side batsmen.They scored 114 and we moved on to Masham.I found out later Eryholme won with six overs to spare.
Masham were playing Spennithorne on the pretty ground.Thev away side had scored 110 which was enough to win the match.There were more enthusiasm in this match than Harrogate.

Thursday. Arrived at Harrogate to find that Brophy had scored 101 while we had been in the Dales.Half the grass had been laid down.Brophy was soon out but we were able to watch Lees reach his century.After lunch he was out for 138 but Wainwright was batting very well. Comments by the Yorkshire players was that he looked like a white Brian Lara.He reached 180 runs in 179 balls.Yorkshire declared at 537 for 7.Two Irish wickets fell during the tea session.We moved on to watch Northallerton against Spennithorne in the Peter Bentley Cup.Spennithorne had sored 137 for 5 and when we arrived Northallerton were batting.Two batsmen reached 33 but five players were out for a duck.The home side lost by 27 runs so we went to the bar. There I started talking to a Leeds Rugby supporter who had seen the 1952 Cup Final.A very interesting conversation.

Friday.The match started at 10.15 so the Irish side could catch the early evening flight . There was no difficulty in this as they were all out by Noon.So we went to St. Peter.s to watch Yorkshire Under 19,s against Durham Academy who were batting.
We had leave early so I could watch Leeds v Hull at Rugby.

Saturday. We went to Hanging Heaton against Farsley.There was talk about the ten point deduction to Farsley for fielding a uneligible player.There was a delayed start due to rain and surprisingly Farsley batted.They reached 129 in 34. 2 overs with Mark Lawson taking three wickets.All the Farsley supporters thought they would lose however this was not the case. Ingram taking four cheap wickets after his run out while he was batting.

Sunday. Hoped to watch Saltaire against Bankfoot but the rain stopped that so we moved on to Headingley. Yorkshire were batting against Middlesex in a forty over match.Yorkshire reached 196 with the help of Lyth and Ballance.I had to take Andrew to his train while Yorkshire lost the match.

A busy few days and now I can write the blog and print out the matches we saw.