Posted by Tony Hutton
Saturday 11th August - always a pleasure to visit Driffield cricket club in East Yorkshire, travelling on a splendid new bit of road over Garrowby Hill and traversing the Yorkshire Wolds, one of the hidden gems of Yorkshire. The Kings Mill Road ground covers a large area and is in fact large enough to have two cricket grounds, the first team entertaining the Yorkshire Academy on the main ground and Driffield Third Eleven hosting Welton 1st XI on the number two ground.
Driffield are struggling somewhat this season having lost a few regular players at the start of the season, notably the two Kohler-Cadmore brothers and Sam Drury, who now captains Scarborough.
However, they have welcomed back young Alex Drury after a spell with today's opponents the Yorkshire Academy. They suffered a bad defeat at Scarborough last week and were missing another couple of regulars today.
Early discussions among the handful of travelling Academy supporters centred around the decision to disqualify the county side from the Rudgate cup final after their semi-final victory over Barnsley, described by John Winn last week. The problem seems to be that by playing Harry Brook in the semi-final they fielded an ineligible player, in that he had only played five league games this season instead of the statutory six, apparently a rule change made half way through the season.
This ruling apparently has other ramifications regarding Woodhouse Grange due to play Aston Hall in the other semi-final. They are having difficulty raising a side for this fixture and planned to field several regular second eleven players who have also not played the minimum number of games and would be declared ineligible as well. This seems another case of cricket shooting itself in the foot, surely any bona-fide member of the club should be eligible to play at all times as opposed to someone brought in from elsewhere at the last minute. We await further developments.
Today's game proved to be rather a one sided affair with a fine batting display from the visitors built largely around a second wicket partnership of 146 between skipper Ben Birkhead and George Hill. Driffield were handicapped by the early loss, due to injury, of opening bowler Ollie Ezard and their attack was largely dominated by spin, with Nick Hardgrave and Kavindu Kulasekara both proving rather expensive.
Birkhead unluckily missed out on a century when Hargrave had him lbw for 96, but Hill completed his century, the third we have seen him make this season, all for different sides - Sedbergh School, Yorkshire under 17s and now the Academy. Kulasekara picked up two wickets near the end when hitters Barnes and Taylor were promoted in the order. Tom Loten, who has been consistent all season, lost the strike towards the end and was left stranded on 49 not out. The Academy total by this time had reached 293-5.
Driffield's reply was led by the diminutive Alec Drury and with help from Kulasekara he took the score to 81 before the second wicket fell. After that it became a bit of a procession until wicket keeper Mark Goddard stuck around near the end with a useful 28. Soon after he was out Drury completed his century, which included eleven fours, and with the help of the injured Ollie Ezard coming in at number eleven, managed to hold out until the end with Driffield on 221-9.
This meant the Academy only collected eight points for an incomplete win and Driffield managed two points for achieving a score in excess of 70 per cent of their opponents' innings. Joshua Sullivan again impressed with 3-58, despite lacking the support of his young brother who has been away at the Bunbury Festival this week. There was a certain sameness about the five man Academy seam attack. They all try hard but nobody stands out as a prospect for the future. Time may prove me wrong, but Yorkshire need another bowler like Ben Coad to make a breakthrough soon.
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