Hampshire's first game at £17m new ground washed out
Hampshire's big day was ruined when umpires Trevor Jesty and John Holder decided it would be impossible to stage the first ever scheduled match at their new £17 million ground at the Rose Bowl, West End
Andy Ford
02-May-2001
Hampshire's big day was ruined when umpires Trevor Jesty and John Holder
decided it would be impossible to stage the first ever scheduled match at
their new £17 million ground at the Rose Bowl, West End.
Jesty and Holder, both former Hampshire players, surveyed the pools of water
across the new pitch and decided play in the Benson & Hedges Cup match
against Essex couldn't go ahead some 90 minutes before the game was due to
start.
Hampshire captain Robin Smith said: "There was never any chance. The water
has got everywhere and it would have been impossible which is a great shame
because this was due to be such a memorable occasion in Hampshire's
history."
Around 200 spectators had made their way to the new ground but left as soon
as the announcement of the abandonment was made.
Hampshire chief executive Tony Baker said: "This is very sad because
everything had been geared to this first match but it has been typical of
our bad luck.
"The whole project has been fraught with disappointment in one form or
another. We just hope that the pitch will have dried up by Friday when we're
due to play here again but with more rain forecast even that can't be
guaranteed.
"I feel sorry for our groundsman Nigel Gray who has put in hundreds of hours
work on the new pitch but there was nothing he could have done and the story
would have been the same if we were still at Northlands Road."
Gray added: "There was never any real chance even if it had been a dry day.
The wet weather has been awful and I have not been able to work on the
square as much as I would have liked."