Sunday 16th September at Arthington cricket club for the opening game of their end of season festival of friendly cricket, which goes on until mid-October. I have been coming here for twenty years now and nothing much has changed, even the weather, which is usually kind, seemed to change for the better as we came over the hill from damp and cloudy Leeds. Only a handful of spectators for this first game against Romany, one of the last of the wandering Sunday sides. The numbers will slowly increase over the next few weeks as the regulars become aware that league cricket has ended and that Arthington is here again.
The rural ground, with a large collection of sheep at one end, is situated in the grounds of Arthington Hall and across the road from Arthington church, now converted from Church of England to the Coptic Church, with quite a few children present this afternoon. Arthington are batting and the personnel hardly seem to have changed over the last twenty years. Joe Nash and Geoff Barker open the batting and standing as umpire, although still playing as well, Martin Binks club secretary for many years, but now secretary of the extensive Nidderdale League which runs to eight divisions over a large area of North Yorkshire.
Martin is a man of many parts, not only long serving conductor of the Leeds Symphony Orchestra, but a wicket keeper to boot, not bad for a man in his late seventies. The much improved club's website informs us that Martin made his 400th appearance for the club in July. It also rather unkindly dwells on his batting ability, which one could say is almost non-existent. He has in fact played 130 innings and scored a total of 130 runs at an average of 2.22. Sadly we are not given the number of victims he has taken behind the stumps which will be quite considerable.
The merger with Hawksworth cricket club in recent years means that Arthington now field a first and second eleven in the Nidderdale League and both have been extremely successful. It has also prolonged the careers of 'golden oldies' like Martin and the even older Dennis Nash, who is still taking wickets for the second team, while the youngsters have produced two promotions in the last two seasons for the first team. The website confirms that Dennis had taken 396 wickets for the club a few weeks ago, so I assume he must now have passed the 400 mark.
The action continued on the field with perfectionist Geoff Barker, taking his time as usual. Joe Nash was replaced by the considerable presence of Vince Greaves-Newell and the runs were flowing at a positive rate, with the mixture of youth and experience in the Romany side not looking to pose many threats to the batsmen. Dennis Nash also came out to do his stint as umpire, meaning that the combined ages of the two officials were now in the region of 160, but none the worse for that!
Another perennial batsman, Andrew Stothard, who must also have at least twenty years service in the festival, appears, also large in stature and perhaps a little slower between the wickets but always adding to the entertainment which continues unabated until the end of the forty overs. A useful total of almost 200 with only four wickets down was quite acceptable. Sadly another regular performer of years gone by, Stephen Bindman, was only among the spectators today but he put us all right about the state of Yorkshire county cricket.
As the players took tea, admirably produced as ever by Mrs Nash, it was time to leave. The result does not really matter, but we will hear about it later in the week and will certainly be back next weekend for more of the same.
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