School half term is upon us. A time when all grandparents should have undergone a concentrated fitness course to prepare them for the week ahead. The good news however, is that eight weeks today Yorkshire will be stepping out at Worcester to start the defence of the county cricket championship. That assumes of course that the ground will not be under water, as it often is at this time of the year.
Before that happens we will have to endure the cricket world cup, the Indian premier league and an England tour of the West Indies, which will be still going on when the proper cricket starts here. Yorkshire, probably missing about half their first team on England duty, will be playing the MCC towards the end of March in Abu Dhabi in front of a few hardened travelling followers and even more camels.
This travesty of what used to be the traditional opening game of the season at Lord's is yet another symptom of the proliferation of T20 cricket to the exclusion of all else. If the tradition of a game at the end of April could continue, a much larger contingent of Yorkshire members might travel to Lord's at a slightly lower cost than flying out to the desert.
Still there is more good news. A circular from Stephen Chalke, possibly the crown prince of current cricket writers, confirms that his latest book 'Summer's Crown', a history of the county championship, will be published late in March at a price of £20. I am sure it will prove to be an absolute bargain. Stephen had to postpone a trip to the Northern Cricket Society as the book took longer than anticipated to write, but will be doing a tour of Yorkshire cricket Societies in September and October.
The dates for these are 29th September at Halifax 13 Cricket Society, 6th October at Northern Cricket Society, Headingley and 8th October at Wombwell Cricket Lovers, Barnsley.
Apart from Yorkshire's signing of three well publicised overseas players, one hopes that several of the younger generation will also get a chance in the first team this season, particularly as many of the regulars may be on England duty. Probably next in line as batsmen are Jack Leaning and Will Rhodes, but Ryan Gibson who was outstanding for the Academy last season might also get a chance. Of the bowlers it would be nice to see Moin Ashraf back to form and fitness, but apparently he has suffered another injury while playing in Australia. Other bowlers who have impressed are the England Under 19 trio of Shaw, Fisher and Carver, the slow left arm bowler.
There have been a good few changes in personnel moving from various counties. Lancashire for instance, having lost Kyle Hogg through injury and released Oliver Newby and Kabir Ali, look short of pace bowlers, but have recruited Nathan Buck from Leicester and George Edwards from Surrey. Joe Denly has left Middlesex to return to his original county Kent who have lost Geraint Jones, who will captain Gloucester, and Mark Davies, the former Durham player, who has retired.
Gloucester have perhaps suffered the greatest loss as both Gidman brothers have moved on. Will to Notts and Alex to Worcester. Andre Adams, the very useful New Zealander, has left Notts to join Hampshire. Derbyshire could have made a good move in signing the young all rounder Shiv Thakor, who was troubled by injury at Leicester, but has always looked a very good prospect.
Steve Kirby has retired at Somerset and Nick Compton has also returned to his original county of Middlesex to replace Denly.
There are quite a few more movers and shakers and I will do another summary as the season approaches. All that remains is to study the proliferation of county, minor county, university and second eleven fixtures now available and try to work out the best possible programme despite, as usual, many unfortunate clashes.
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