P Agnew: Lancashire League Feature (14 Sep 1998)

14 September 1998

Lancashire League Feature

The Lancashire Evening Telegraph

Long before information technology threatened a takeover, cricket held a monopoly on confusion and complication, writes PAUL AGNEW.

Entrepreneurial types made a killing selling tea towels emblazoned with mickey-taking slogans like "cricket - the rules as explained to a foreign visitor."

But you don't need to be from another planet to be baffled by what goes on. Take the Lancashire League, where there seems to have been a concerted effort to bemuse people. The very people, collectively known as crowds, who gather every weekend to watch every ball bowled over a six-hour period. Then, come close of play, they test one another with questions like "who won?"

Daft. Of course it's daft, but it's true too. Presumably those responsible for rule making want to continue to attract paying customers. If so, then the time has come to take stock. The criteria must be to simplify an already complex game. To produce a format which suits players and spectators alike.

To find rules without obvious and laughable loopholes. Rules designed to promote attractive play, encourage positive outcomes, eliminate potential farce and reduce gamesmanship.

Not an easy task granted, but one which needs addressing. And there are seven months before the 1998 champions Nelson begin their defence. Time enough to sort the job out or at least fine tune a slice of what already lies in place.

Yesterday, the summer's top dogs played out a tame draw with Ramsbottom.

It was a match which went some way to proving that whatever the rule book states the responsibility for entertainment lies with those on the pitch. Nelson provided a bit with their batting effort, Roger Harper contributing 62 before being run out "backing up," out of his ground as the ball caught a deflection off the bowler to break the wicket at the non-striking end.

Ramsbottom's sub pro did his bit too, as a bowler, tacking 3-61. It's been a satisfying season for 25-year-old Jonathan Fielding, once an amateur with Ramsbottom, later on the staff at Old Trafford and taker of some 100 wickets with Clitheroe this term.

Despite Fielding, Nelson posted a respectable 157-6 - respectable, but not beyond reach. Or so we all thought. Ramsbottom did not seem to share the view and took 45 overs to assemble 81 runs for the loss of six wickets.

It was a bore. With ten overs to go the visitors still needed 100. Not the sort of fare to have you waiting with impatience for the dawn of next season. Fair enough, Harper bowled tightly - doesn't he always? - but 81 runs in 270 balls, including just two boundaries and Tommy Read occupying the crease for 102 balls for an undefeated 26.

Nelson tried seven bowlers and even wicketkeeper Michael Bradley took off his pads to trundle in for the final over. Surprise, surprise, it was a maiden.

Source :: Lancashire Evening Telegraph (https://www.reednews.co.uk/let/)