Headingley Evening League (part two)

Posted by Tony Hutton

During Thursday afternoon called in at the Leeds University ground at Weetwood, where there appears little chance of any competitive cricket this season. The University season never started and now that the Yorkshire Academy have opted out of the Premier League North it appears there will be no competitive games for them. However the Academy squad were in action, having a game amongst themselves in strict quarantine conditions. We did a circuit of the ground watching from a distance feeling that may be the only action we see here this season. Groundsman Richard Robinson as ever has kept the ground trim and tidy throughout lockdown but is very despondent at the lack of any cricket.

Later in the day we were able to see competitive cricket just a little further down the Leeds Ring Road at New Rover where the home side were playing Adel in the second week of Headingley Evening League fixtures. This really was a hard fought game which could have gone either way right to the last over. After a cloudy, drizzly day yet again, it brightened up later on with even a glimpse of evening sunshine.

Evening sunshine at New Rover.

Adel after their victory in this league last week and a first win in the Aire Wharfe league at the weekend must have been in confident mood, especially with newcomer George Hogg, from the Nottingham area, who scored a century on debut last Saturday, in their ranks. They compiled a useful first innings score of 158-4 in their twenty overs with fifty from opener Tom Harrison and the help of 39 extras.

As New Rover had been bowled out for fifty last week, Adel must have been confident of victory at the half way stage, but the reckoned without veteran batsman Michael Richmond, recalled to the ranks after last week's fiasco. After three early wickets had fallen, one of which being an outstanding one handed catch in the deep by James Thorp, Richmond took command and was only dismissed for 77 shortly before the end. Two more wickets had already fallen before then, with some more outstanding catching. One of which got rid of the man with the longest name seen for some time in Christodoulos Bogdanos no less.

New Rover made the winning runs with just two balls remaining to earn a worthy victory and it must be said they made more use of the short boundary on one side of the wicket, at the very edge of the square, than their opponents. New Rover hit six sixes in total, three by Richmond, against just one by Adel.

In the two other games played there was a second win for pace setters Rawdon who made 230-4 and restricted Leeds Modernians to 96-8, whereas St. Chads had a narrow victory over Cookridge in a low scoring game.

My first matches

By Brian Sanderson

Originally I was going to go to York but the rain put me off so

I went closer ie Kirkstall Education who were playing Bardsey 

in the Second Division of the Airedale and Wharfedale League.

When I walked through  the gate Bardsey were batting  well.

The two Wainman brothers were out and Mohammed Altaf

was batting on a good wicket and a short boundary.

I was able to talk to a number of people I had not seen for 

it seems months ago.On of those was Brian Senior who 

was watching his first outside match of 2020 .

The match had been reduced to 44  overs but Bardsey 

still reached 318 runs for 9 wickets. Harwood Williams,

the West Indian captain scored a very entertaining 50.

The Kirkstall side seemed very young and bowled

28 wides. The innings took about three hours.

James Wainman, the ex Yorkshire left arm bowler was told 

by the umpire he could not fulfil his overs because he was 

running on the wicket. However Bardsey bowlers soon picked up 

wickets .However Kirkstall hung on for a draw scoring 231 for 9.

Good to see two umpires and Dave Hodgson the Kirkstall 

groundsman and artist.

On the Sunday I drove up to New Rover who were playing 

Adel thirds in the Airedale and Wharfedale 3rd X1 

Conference B league. New Rover had a mixture of young 

and old including a young girl  who bowled medium right arm.

Good to see. Also there was Brian Senior enjoying the sunshine.

Adel batted first and scored 136 for 9 in the 36 overs. There 

seemed to be more stoppages and the innings finished at 4.45pm.

Another long innings time wise .Later I found New Rover finished

finished two runs short.

Great to be able to see some live cricket but the forecast is not

 great for this weekend but it may change hopefully.

Yorkshire Premier League North

Posted by Tony Hutton

Saturday brought the first games in the new format of the Yorkshire Premier League North with just ten teams taking part, in the absence of both Scarborough and the Yorkshire Academy. Now reduced to 40 overs a side, instead of the normal 50 overs, and the start times put back to 1 p.m. from the original 12 noon. However at Clifton Park, York where the home side were entertaining Sheriff Hutton Bridge, they had decided to revert to 12 noon, which was just as well on a day punctuated with drizzling rain which in fact delayed the start by about half an hour. With the endless sanitising breaks after every six overs, the match went on well into the late evening, but did produce the only full overs game in the league.

 

Play gets underway at Clifton Park.

After a minute's silence marked with both times lining up in the centre in respect of Dan Woods, the former York captain, the home side were put into bat and lost prolific opener Duncan Snell early on. His partner Guy Darwin pulled things together with an innings of 59, despite losing Harry Adair, a Durham second team player for only 7. Darwin was given good support by Nick James with 24 and later by Alex Lilley, on debut. Lilley's excellent running between the wickets kept the innings going almost to the end with a fine knock of 52 from only 48 balls.

The drizzle did not attract many clients to the York beer garden.

York reached a reasonable total 195-9, with the bowling honours for Sheriff Hutton Bridge going to Freddie Collins with 4-34 and Matthew Bird with 3-43. The Bridge were missing two county second teamers who have gone elsewhere in Ed Barnes and Karl Carver, as well as Matthew Fisher, still very much part of the Yorkshire squad, who was relegated to the role of spectator and dog walker.

Not much social distancing here!

The Bridge lost both openers with the total on 26, but skipper Adam Fisher and Tommy Hudson then put on a stand of 99 for the third wicket to swing the game back their way. After Fisher went for 46, Hudson survived a middle order collapse, which saw them reduced to 143-6, and went on to score 90 before being dismissed with only seven more runs required. Wicket keeper Toby Latham saw the Bridge home with 26 not out and only three balls remaining.

Clifton Alliance

The game next door at Clifton Alliance got off to a much later start presumably due to the lack of the same amount of covers available to their more wealthy neighbours. The game with Dunnington was reduced to 24 overs per side with Alliance reaching their target of 149 with only one ball to spare.

The game between Castleford and Harrogate was abandoned due to rain and elsewhere in reduced overs matches Acomb beat Driffield and Stamford Bridge beat Woodhouse Grange.

Dunnington batting at Clifton Alliance.

Stamford Bridge made the highest score of the day with 206-4 from 29 overs, Dominic Rhodes scoring 80 not out and Ben Pearson 61. In reply Woodhouse Grange only managed 120-5 in 21 overs and were thirty short of their target.

Historic Events at Harrogate Road

posted by John Winn

Local cricket was a bit like the proverbial London bus on Saturday. You wait three months for the season to  start and find that the first elevens of the three clubs on your doorstep are all at home. Spoilt  for choice and undaunted by light rain I opted to visit Green Hammerton's Harrogate Road ground on what was a historic day, not just in terms of the playing conditions imposed by covid 19 but because after 100 years the Wetherby League is now The Leeds and Wetherby Cricket League. This new title reflects the fact that of the twelve clubs that make up the league eleven have LS postcodes. The exception to this is Green Hammerton based as it is at YO26 8AB. Green Hammerton is just ten miles from York and twenty five miles from Leeds and it must have been tempting for the club to join the exodus of clubs to the York League.

The reward for this loyalty is a place in the first division of the 'new' league, and asking around it seems that this may well be the first time the club has played at this level. The club has had a somewhat chequered history over the last fifty years, having on two occasions played away from the village but they came home in 2002 and since 2010 have enjoyed the facilities of the new village hall for changing and refreshment, until Saturday that is when players were expected to arrive changed and bring their own teas.

When I arrived and despite the drizzle, play was  underway and visitors Crossgates were batting. I had not been there long when all pretence at normality was abandoned when the fielding side left the field for a sanitising break, the first I had witnessed in seventy years of watching and playing cricket. If not  a red letter day certainly a clean hands day.

This procedure was repeated every six overs throughout the afternoon.

Crossgates made slow progress to start with but the scoring rate was soon stepped up and Hammerton's fielding became increasingly ragged. 215 for 4 off the prescribed 35 overs looked a formidable score and so it proved with Hammerton making a woeful start to find themselves 11 for 3. Things improved a little mainly thanks to a stand between Amit Patel and Ryan Blackburn but with seven batsmen dismissed for single figures the innings closed after 24 overs for 100, a shortfall of 115, a chastening afternoon for Green Hammerton who may feel that greatness has been thrust upon them. 

In closing I must congratulate the two umpires, David Spavin and John Fisher, on the admirable way in which they coped with the extra regulations, and both teams on the good spirit in which the game was played. 

First competitive match of 2020

Posted by Tony Hutton

The Headingley Evening League got underway last night with my first competitive match of 2020.

The league now has only seven teams, so each Thursday night until the end of August there will be three games, with one team without a game. A return to my old stamping ground of Church Lane, Adel saw the home side entertain near neighbours St. Chads, with all start times for this T20 competition brought forward to 6 p.m.

Cricket 2020 style with Adel players locked out of their own pavilion.

St. Chads, not quite resplendent in their now customary coloured clothing batted first against Adel, who at least looked more like cricketers in their more appropriate whites. One noticeable difference to the ground since Sunday's inter club practice game was the strange appearance of the square which looked as if it had been completely shaved very closely by some local barber just returned to work.

The visitors lost an early wicket but looked to have recovered somewhat until wickets fell at regular intervals, particularly towards the end of the innings where Sam O'Sullivan took three wickets for fifteen runs to complete his four over spell. St. Chads ended on 76-8 in their allotted twenty overs.

Not a challenging total you might think, and so it proved as openers Tom Harrison and Ed Watt set about the St. Chads bowlers in fine style. Harrison was eventually out for 32 with the score on 62-1, but Watt continued on his merry way with three fours and three sixes in his 39 not out. Adel raced to a nine wicket victory in just ten and a half overs and the evening's entertainment was soon over.

A fine evening in familiar surroundings made all the more pleasant by catching up with old friends and feeling that the despair of the first half of the season has been replaced by anticipation of the months ahead.

Results from elsewhere, from the league's admirable website, showed that New Rover (all out 55) lost to Rawdon by ten wickets in only 4.2 overs and Horsforth Hall Park knocked up 205-5, with an opening stand of 169, to beat Leeds Modernians (88-8) rather easily. The team without a game this week were Cookridge.

Cricketers of the past - Leicestershire 1958

Posted by Tony Hutton

The Leicestershire side of 1958 under a new captain in the form of Willie Watson, double international signed from Yorkshire, made quite a significant improvement to twelfth place, after finishing bottom by a fair distance the previous season. However it was something of a flash in the pan, as apart from reaching the dizzy heights of 9th in 1961, Watson's tenure was not really successful. The first significant improvement came when Tony Lock was appointed captain in the late 1960s and even more so when Ray Illingworth arrived in the 1970s.

Indeed it could be said that one of the minor players on the photograph, Mike Turner, became the most significant figure in the county's history through his role as county secretary for over thirty years, in which time the county's stature in the game increased significantly. In addition he could be said to have been the prime mover in the setting up of one day cricket for the counties with the founding of the Gillette Cup.

The strength of the 1958 side could be said to rest largely with the front row. The back row contains a fair few passengers, as well as several consistent county journeymen. We will start with Robin Gardner, first left on the back row. He played for Leicester from 1954 to 1962 as a batsman, making exactly 1000 runs in his best season of 1959.

Next is Jack Van Gelovan, a Yorkshireman, who played a handful of games for his home county in 1955. He gave excellent service as a genuine all rounder between 1956 and 1965, doing the double in 1962. He then played Minor Counties cricket for Northumberland before becoming a first class umpire. Alan Revill, a cavalier batsman, had a long career with Derbyshire before coming to Leicester for three seasons in 1958.

Brian Boshier was a very tall opening bowler who took 510 wickets between 1953 and 1964. A consistent performer with the ball, he achieved very little with the bat and was plagued with injuries later in his career. However he played league cricket for Harrogate for a while.

Jeff Goodwin, from Staffordshire, was a left hand bat and left arm medium pace bowler who took 335 wickets for Leicester, including a best performance of 8-81. John Savage, a Lancastrian, was one of the best off spinners in English cricket but his lack of batting ability counted against him. His best season was 1961 when he took 122 wickets, including a hat trick against Somerset. After ten years at Leicester he returned to Lancashire for a while, before becoming second eleven captain and then coach at Old Trafford.

Mike Turner was a right hand bat and a leg spin bowler, but achieved little success in ten first class appearances. However his ability as an administrator, with thirty three years as county secretary, brought him considerable fame and rejuvenated the county. He was awarded an M.B.E. for services to cricket. Edmund Philips was a batsman from Shropshire, who played only 32 matches before leaving in 1959. His highest score was 55.

The five stalwarts on the front row start with another Yorkshireman, wicket keeper Jack Firth, who played just eight games for his native county. He joined Leicester in 1951 when already 32 years of age and gave outstanding service until 1958, He took 373 catches and made 95 stumpings. His highest score was 90 not out against Essex.

Then we have Gerry Lester whose career started before the war in 1937 and went on until 1958. A consistent opening batsman who played 373 matches, he scored 12,000 runs and took 300 rather expensive wickets with his leg breaks. He became second XI captain and coach.

Willie Watson, played 25 Tests for England and earned four soccer caps during his career with Huddersfield Town and Sunderland. He was a left hand bat who scored over 25,000 career runs during his time with Yorkshire and Leicestershire. He was with Yorkshire from 1939 to 1957 and Leicester from 1958-1964. After retirement as a player he emigrated to South Africa where he took up coaching.

Maurice Hallam was Leicestershire through and through. He played 500 matches as an opening batsman between 1950 and 1970, scoring 24,000 runs and captaining the side for four seasons during the 1960s. Finally we have pace bowler Terry Spencer, a most consistent opening bowler from 1952 to 1969. He sadly died earlier this year and is probably best remembered for his part in the famous tied game between Yorkshire and Leicestershire at Huddersfield in 1954 when he took 9-63.

 

Locked out at Scarborough

By Brian Sanderson

On a wet afternoon at Headingley, I was pleased to receive

the above scorecard from 7 September 1949. New Zealand 

were visiting the shores lend by Walter Hadlee. They played

four Test Matches and drew them all. there only loss on the 

tour was to Oxford University in May on a pitch that was 

recovering from flooding.

New Zealand lost the toss and Hutton and Simpson opened 

the batting against Cave and Reid which were not the normal

opening attack. Hutton during this match raised his season

aggregate to 3429 beating Sutcliffe total 3336 runs in season.

Joe Hardstaff batted well to score 123  out of 192 in two 

hours forty minutes  which helped Leverson Gowers X1 

to a total of 348 at the end of the first day.

Large crows watched the match , the gates being closed  on 

the first two afternoons. Martin Donnelly, the New Zealand

amateur scored a excellent 145 not out  helping to get the team

to 338.he was also a excellent rugby union player who played

for England.

On the third day Norman Yardley set a target of 213 in two 

hours. Hadlee set the pace with Sutcliffe ,who left at 151 ,

having hit one 6 and eleven 4's. Four men were out for 172

and twenty minutes remained ,but Donnelly hit four 4's 

in an over of Bedser and Wallace finished the match  with

a six in front of square leg off Yardley two minutes from 

time. 

Whilst this match was been played Leeds were playing 

Wigan and for a change Arthur Clues got sent off.

He also played cricket for Leeds Cricket Club and was

known to hit a few sixes.