On Sunday after a false start I made the trip to Harrogate for Yorkshire Women's last match of the season against Lancashire. The stop start nature of my departure was caused by a tweet that showed Lancashire 27 for 7 and the feeling that it was not worth the journey but checking half an hour later the red rose had perked up a little and when I arrived they were still batting. 113 all out was not likely to frighten the champs elect but at least it had made a game of things and I settled down with David Thorpe to watch proceedings on a pleasant enough afternoon.
David can always be relied on to put me properly in the picture at these matches and he explained that if Yorkshire could knock off the runs at four an over they would gain enough bonus points to finish as county champions, thus emulating their male counterparts. Openers Allen and Winfield made a positive start but Allen went at 13 to bring in Brunt and the score had reached 82 for 2 before shefell to a smart catch which brought in Loughborough student and Gloucestershire loanee Alex MacDonald. She began with two stylish defensive shots but after that saw very little action as skipper Winfield bossed proceedings, bringing up her fifty and the hundred but the moment of glory was left to Alex who scampered a two to seal victory by eight wickets at something close to five an over and spark off joyous celebrations.
Yesterday contrasted markedly with Sunday for although the morning was warm by the afternoon the cloud had built up and the fare provide by Durham and Worcestershire at The Riverside was pretty poor commons. The start was delayed by half an hour and not surprisingly Collingwood asked The Pears to bat. What followed for the next two hours was turgid stuff, Mitchell for example was 17 not out at lunch off more than 90 deliveries and the only wicket to fall was that of Brett D'Oliveira, not what we expected on a Riverside wicket in September. And not what we expected from a side needing to win. I will draw a veil over the rest, suffice to say that the range of topics in the north west corner ranged far and wide touching upon Joy Beverley, An Inspector Calls, gcse Maths in Lesotho and just occasionally cricket. It was that sort of day not helped by some sloppy fielding from Durham, who looked as though they might have been more interested in the acerage of The Beverley Sisters' wardrobes than playing cricket. We had a break for rain in the afternoon and by the time Peter Sixsmith dropped me at Durham station it was raining again. It seems to have done little else since and I have decided a poorly received Woody Allen film is a better proposition than hanging about at The Riverside.
Finally I can report on the Second XI Championship, the final of which was played last week. I had been unable to find a final table for the northern section, even the one pinned up in the long room at The Riverside showed Durham as having played only eight games, but whilst waiting for my train last night I found an updated one on Cricket Archive. This confirmed what we had known for about three weeks, namely that Notts had finished top but also that Durham were second only one point in arrears. Notts went through to play Middlesex last week and won by four wickets with Will Gidman seeing them home with 94 not out.
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