GRASSROOTS cricket leagues in the Leeds-Bradford-Halifax area have followed their senior leagues within Yorkshire in deciding not to go ahead with fixtures on Saturday, April 20 and Sunday, April 21.
The Gordon Rigg Bradford Premier League and Aire-Wharfe League had already made the call last week to postpone their opening weekend and that decision has now been made across the board.
The ENCO Halifax League have opted to re-arrange their opening day matches for the weekend of September 21-22.
However, the Dales Council League, Timothy Taylor’s Craven League and the Bradford Mutual Sunday School League will not be re-arranging this weekend’s fixtures and will instead give teams regulation points for abandoned matches.
The Halifax League statement reads: “The first weekend of 2024 fixtures in the ENCO Halifax Cricket League, for both Saturday and Sunday leagues have been called off and rearranged for September 21-22.
“A survey of grounds found that only a handful of clubs reported any chance of play, while the large majority replied with two words ‘no chance’.
“The dreadful weather over the past weeks has seen groundsmen struggling to even get onto saturated grounds to do any preparatory work with the continuous heavy rain.
“Hopefully the weather will allow the season to commence on Saturday April 27. However, if this is not the case then standard inclement weather cancellation rules will apply with no further rearrangements.”
Craven League secretary Peter Forster issued the following statement: “Due to ground conditions the first week’s fixtures (Saturday April 20) in the CDCL have been cancelled, all teams will receive five points. The games will not be replayed.
“With regard to fixtures on April 27, clubs will be contacted during the coming week on the likelihood of playing, and a decision will be made by Wednesday April 24, with clubs informed at that time.”
Ron Mackenzie, secretary of the Dales Council League, put this statement on their website: “The weather overnight and forecast for the rest of the week has confirmed the league's decision to cancel all fixtures scheduled for the coming weekend. All teams scheduled to play on Saturday will be awarded four points.
“Some senior leagues have rearranged games from this Saturday to the end of the season and this may affect availability in September where our teams share a ground. We have already got some games scheduled for week 23 and so have no room to move this first round of fixtures.
“The executive will make a further judgement about the matches on April 27 early next week.”
Meanwhile, Hafiz Ur Rehman, secretary of the Bradford Mutual Sunday School League, confirmed that their matches this Saturday have all been cancelled, with each team being awarded nine points, and that they would not be re-arranged.
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