Here we go again

 posted by John Winn

                                    When baby summer calls us once again

                                     to close trimmed turf; we say we will not go 

                                     but yet we go. Digby Jephson*

Pending hip surgery is restricting my driving at the moment but had I been fully fit then today I would have been at Riverside, Chester le Street where Durham are taking on  Durham University and where, on a lovely March day, the county side took the precaution of including Raine, Drissell and Macintosh in their XI. I have complained in the past about the stilted start to the English cricket season, just compare it to the fanfare for the start of the Major League Baseball season later this week, but at least the county championship when it opens next Thursday will see all 18 counties in action. Match of the Day has to be Lancashire, tipped by Cricketer magazine to be champions, taking on Surrey, last year's winners, at Old Trafford. Well done algorithm. Nonsense I hear some of you cry as you head to Headingley to see relegated Yorkshire take on wooden spoonists Leicestershire. 

If league cricket is more your bag then I have done my usual exercise of working through a few websites to find out when readers in the north east and Yorkshire will be able to see their local clubs in action. Most have opted for the traditional third Saturday in April, this year the fifteenth, the earliest it can be. 

These leagues are in action that day, Bradford, Dales Council, Craven and District, Huddersfield, Yorkshire Premier (South), North Yorkshire South Durham, North East Premier, Nidderdale, Durham & North East 

22nd April Aire Wharfe, Yorkshire Premier (North) and its supporting pyramid, Pontefract and District, Langbaurgh, Darlington and District, Bradford Mutual.

29th April Scarborough 

Good watching!

* This little poem which I came across ten years ago in a book entitled The Demon and The Lobster, was written by Digby Jephson who played for Cambridge University and Surrey. Jephson was known as the lobster because of his skill as an underarm bowler between 1890 and 1902, although he made very few appearances after 1902. The Demon refers to Charles Kortright, a contemporary of Jephson. considered one of the fastest bowlers of all time. The two men were distantly related. 

                                                                       

                                                                      Digby Jephson