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Secretary's Report for 2001
Congratulations to Netherfield who comfortably defended their position as League Champions with a weekend of the season to spare.This was their fourth success in five seasons.The runners up were Chorley leading a group of five clubs separated over a range of thirteen points.This illustrated the opinion held by many round the league that on their day any team was capable of beating any other.
Leyland too made their mark, though struggling in the League, they won the Nuffield Hospital Cup beating Darwen in the final.
Netherfield added to their League Championship success by beating Chorley to win the Slater Cup.
Fleetwood and Lancaster were in close contention for the Second XI Championship with Fleetwoods haul of bonus points giving them the edge.
Lancaster beat St Annes to win the Blackledge Trophy and Fleetwood beat Lancaster to take the Latus Trophy.
We are grateful to Rawcliffe's Inter-Sport in conjunction with the Evening Gazette for sponsoring an amateur awards scheme.
The individual Batting performance of the year was by Phillip Thornton of Morecambe whose 871 runs broke his club's amateur record .Peter Stephens of Morecambewas again the leading amateur wicket taker with 55 wickets.Tom Prime of Netherfield took most catches and Phil Iddon of Leyland Motors the most wicket keeping victims.
Pieter Strydom of Netherfield with 1158 runs and Josh Marquet of Chorley with 69 wickets were the leading professionals.
We lost in the semi-final of the Manchester Evening News Inter-League competition to the Bolton League.
Our thanks to David Higham for managing this team.Injuries,late cry offs and clashes with club matches in Lancashire and National competitions make it frustrating and extremely difficult to pick a fully representative side.
In the U/17 competition Darwen became champions by beating Blackpool in the final.
More is written about youth cricket elsewhere in the Handbook but the contribution to the development of cricket made by those who run and coach in the Club Junior sections and those who organise the representative sides must be recognised and praised.
This season their efforts have been amply rewarded by winning the North West Colts Trophy and the number of representative honours they gained.
Pride and place going to Jack Kelliher of St Annes who captained the England U/15 team and Tom Smith of Chorley who played for the England U/17 team and was awarded the Cedric Rhoades Trophy for the outstanding young Lancashire cricketer of the year.
The formation of a feeder league system is one of the main criteria for our continuing to be a Premier League. Attempts to attract a suitable league to become a feeder league failed and the attempt to attract enough clubs to form a second division to act as a mainfeeder league also failed.
The LCB are making an attempt to solve the problem.
Wether the ECB will continue to accredit us as a Premier League is questionable.
A meeting was held at the end of the season where captains and others were able to informally discuss problems and cricketing matters.
A suggestion arising from the meeting has been put into operation.
In 2002 the two cup competitions will be replaced by a League Cup competition.The clubs will be divided into two groups of six.Each club in the group will play each other once on a fixed date with a finals day at the end of the season to decide the Cup winner
The hope is that this will give all the clubs a minimum of five cup games and ensure all clubs have some Sunday cricket in July and August.
Modifications have been made to the disicplinary rules which gives the clubs more responsibility for taking disiciplinary action and provides some Diciplinary Guidelines which will make the range of penalties that will result from breaches of the Code of Conduct clear to all.
We hope that these modifications give the umpires more support.
Our thanks go to our sponsors Bay Radio and The Lancaster and Lakeland Nuffield Hospital for their support, to John and Judith Richardson for their efficient distribution of the results and to the media who continue to give us excellent coverage.
We thank the umpires who have had the added difficulty over the last two or three seasons of coping with changes of playing conditions, changes of rule and occasionally with ill disicplined players.
We recognise also the band of volunteers who work unseen with paintbrush, mower and in many other ways to make it a pleasure to play and watch cricket in our grounds.
My own persoal thanks to all who through their good humour and co-operation make my task as secretary as pleasurable as possible.
John Cooper
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