A friendly start at Goldsborough

posted by John Winn

Late yesterday morning a text from Tony Hutton from Trent Bridge alerted me to cricket at Goldsborough, just a fifteen minute drive from my house. Goldsborough, relegated from Division One of The Nidderdale League last season, were hosts to Fairburn of The Pontefract league, who when I arrived had gone off at a good pace to reach 30 for 1 off five overs. The neat ground was looking very spruce with even the tyres on the sight screen having had a coat of paint. The sky was blue in parts although the air was a little on the cool side and the wicket understandably greenish in colour. But on the fourth day of the fourth month there was a cricket match and no threat of rain, not a bad start to my Saturday wanderings.

The real business for these two clubs starts on April 18th but Goldsborough have another friendly today when Darley are the visitors and Fairburn's website  shows that they will be at home next Saturday to Tadcaster Magnets. Their twitter account even listed the names of the XI who were in action yesterday; something of a family affair it would seem with Jake, Mark, Guy and Simon Abdy all listed.

 

When the sun disappeared I took shelter in the well appointed clubhouse which has an interesting display of photographs and honours boards. Fairburn continued to score at a good pace despite the loss of a couple of wickets, one to a juggling catch off a 'steepler' at mid on that would have been a good effort even on a much warmer today, and reached 129 for 5 off 25. At this point the 'proper' umpire produced a sun hat from his pocket which shamed me into going outside and sitting for a while on a fine seat which to my surprise was not dedicated to somebody who 'loved this view'. Meanwhile the 'improper' umpire, who was only trusted to stand at square leg, wore a hoodie. Ne'er cast a clout.....

Towards the end of the innings the board failed to keep pace with the fall of wickets and even when number one umpire pointed this out, it still said six down when by my count it was seven. Six suddenly became nine and the last pair were separated by a run out going for a second which always looked unlikely to have a successful outcome on the first Saturday of the season.170 all out seemed a good effort on a wicket that was capricious at times and several Fairburn batsmen had felt the ball in the middle of the bat, at times soundly enough to put the ball into the adjacent winter wheat.

Easing myself in gently to the new season and comforted by a text informing me that Darlington FC were 4/1 up against Droylesden I left for home. Goldsborough's twitter account reported that they  had struggled with the bat and were 82 all out and sportingly gave credit to Fairburn for 'acclimatising to the April batting conditions'. My congratulations to Goldsborough for getting their ground in such good shape and for pcws who have not visited their Main Street enclosure then it is worth the short detour off the A59 between Knaresborough and the A1.

Next up for me is Headingley on Tuesday when the first class cricket season reaches the north which is something England's women won't manage when they play Australia this summer, unless you think Worcester is in the north.