The Yorkshire Women's county team completed their championship one day season last week with three successive victories all at home at St George's Road, Harrogate. Having beaten Hampshire, their main rivals for the title, last Sunday Yorkshire were still in with a chance as they faced Notts yesterday. Unfortunately Hampshire had two more bonus points before yesterday and as they completed a maximum win over Middlesex to add a further eighteen points they took the title. So Yorkshire finished as runners up well ahead of third place Kent and both Middlesex and Somerset are relegated from the top division.
The long week started last Sunday, 27th May when Hampshire batted first at Harrogate. They certainly did not bat like champions, losing star New Zealander Suzie Bates cheaply, and it was only the influence of former England captain Charlotte Edwards, batting low down at number eight, that gained them respectability. Edwards showed her class with an outstanding innings of 46 against the much vaunted Yorkshire spin attack. Katie Thompson, with her unusual left arm action, was yet again the star performer with five wickets for only fourteen runs.
With the Hampshire score at one stage only 50-7 everyone was thinking of a very early finish and the possibility of moving on elsewhere, but Edwards had other ideas and with good support from number nine Fritha Morris, who made 31, took the final total to a respectable 131 all out in 48 overs. Pace bowler Beth Langston finished them off by having Edwards caught and dismissing number ten clean bowled on the same total.
Yorkshire made hard work of getting the runs, after a poor start which saw them at 18-3 and then 34-4, but England star Katherine Brunt got them out of trouble with a patient innings of 53 which saw Yorkshire home by four wickets with only two overs to spare. Brunt had good support from Hannah Buck, who scored 40, and helped in a partnership of eighty runs.
The following day, Bank Holiday Monday, Yorkshire's opponents were lowly Somerset and the fact that they batted first did make this game an early finish. Beth Langston with a devastating open spell helped reduce Somerset very quickly to 33-6 and with the spinners Thompson, Kasperek and Hazell proving almost impossible to score off the visitors could only limp to an all out total of 76 in 41 overs. Thompson and Hazell both bowled ten overs and only conceded eight runs each - remarkable.
Yorkshire had no trouble at all in knocking off the runs without loss by the thirteenth over with another England player Lauren Winfield making 45 not out. A really comprehensive victory which shows how strong Yorkshire are, as with the men's team, when their England players are made available.
The final game with Notts yesterday had something of an air of anti-climax as Hampshire's two point lead at the top of the table was soon extended to three when Yorkshire missed out on a batting bonus point and it seemed fairly obvious that the leaders would beat Middlesex which of course they did.
However, Yorkshire even without most of their international players on this occasion, made a useful score which again took some hard work after a poor start and it was thanks to Lee Kasperek, Yorkshire's Scottish New Zealander, who made 68 and wicket keeper Anna Nicholls, 29 not out, that they made 170-7.
Notts who had been in danger of relegation themselves, were safe in the top division but looked a poor side as they were well and truly mesmerised by Yorkshire's all spin attack. They slumped to 45-7 before some aggression by the tale brought them within sight of the hundred mark. They were all out for 96 in the 48th over and Yorkshire winners again this time by 74 runs.
The bowling figures speak for themselves, Thompson 10-4-13-2, Levick 10-5-21-3, Hazell 10-2-26-2 and Kasperek 9.2-3-19-3. Really outstanding performances from them all. Yorkshire's championship season could be summed up as so near and yet so far from the title, but they will go again with great confidence to the T20 tournament coming up next.
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