In my last posting, Wednesday 5th October, I expressed my great disappointment over the punishment handed out to Durham by the ECB for their financial woes. Durham's response has cheered me a little with news of promising young players signing new contracts and an encouraging uptake of memberships for next season despite the loss of first division status. And there is even a little solace in that we will see some new faces in championship action at The Riverside, it is some years for example since the likes of Leicestershire and Glamorgan came to play first class cricket.
Yesterday however the story took another twist with an article in The Times by Elizabeth Ammon under the headline 'Kent may sue after missing promotion' in which she quotes from a letter 'seen by The Times' in which it is alleged that Durham were told in May that they would be relegated at the end of the season. My first thought, expressed in a tweet to my friend Alan Pinkney, was that this meant Durham's last match against Hampshire, the result of which sent the south coast team down, was a sham. Alan replied that of course it went much further than this for if Durham knew in May then the whole season from that point was a sham, that the excitement and tension generated in the last couple of rounds of matches when anyone of four clubs appeared to be in danger of relegation with Notts was just a balloon that could be pricked at any moment if this were to be leaked. To quote Ms Ammon ' .....calling into question the integrity of the whole championship season'.
Later in the morning Durham issued a very brief statement stating 'that they were not told in May that the club would be relegated at the end of the season.' So who do we believe? While Durham suffered something of a slump in the second half of the season anybody who saw their performance on the fourth afternoon of their match with Surrey when, having looked likely losers at tea they fought back to win by 21 runs, a result which at the time seemed to have secured first division cricket for the twelfth season in a row at The Riverside, would not believe they were watching a team who knew it was all a waste of time. Would Mark Wood, by his own admission only 60% fit, have played in that match under such circumstances? And if the Durham dressing room had known for five months that they were part of a charade designed to dupe the paying public into thinking they were watching an honest game would there not have been rumours to that effect leaked to the members, several of whom are blood relatives of the players?
If we can discount the suggestion that the players knew their time was up then it does I suppose leave open the possibility that the DCCC hierarchy had been told of their fate in May but that such a devastating blow had been kept secret from coach Jon Lewis, skipper Paul Collingwood, Durham's backroom staff and least likely of all, Our Hartlepool Correspondent., come on!
Back to Kent, who are on the warpath for they have threatened legal action against the ECB if the latter are not prepared to go to independent arbitration over the decision to reprieve Hants from relegation and deny Kent, who finished second in Division Two, promotion. I know who I am rooting for.
Arthington last Sunday when tea was taken at three during the last match of the season.
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