CLAYTON WEST’S Stuart Rank has been elevated to the Frank Platt Championship wicket-keeping prize after closer inspection of last season’s statistics.
It was thought that Meltham’s Luke Kenworthy, with 35 victims, was the most successful stumper in the 2011 Championship programme.
However, on further investigation into Clayton’s scorebook, it was discovered that Rank had indeed claimed 37 victims, which was confirmed by the League’s match secretary Yvonne Collins.
Rank will now join his teammate and skipper Mark Firth, who won the Championship batting prize, at the League’s awards evening on January 20, when the wicketkeeper will receive the Harry Mellor Cup.
However, because Kenworthy had originally been informed of his success – which he has believed to be the case for the last three months – the League’s newly-formed Executive have chosen to take a sympathetic stance, and decided to also make a one-off special presentation to the young Meltham keeper.
There was similar confusion in the Second Elevens where Honley’s Joe McNamara was named as the winner of the George Harrison Cup as the leading wicketkeeper in the Championship with 20 victims.
Closer inspection revealed that Holmfirth’s gloveman, Michael Battye-Wood had matched that total, and therefore both players will be jointly awarded the trophy at the annual dinner at the Cedar Court Hotel.
“In the case of Kenworthy, we felt that because the lad had been told he was the winner back in September, it would seem a bit harsh to now tell him that we were wrong and he’d won nothing,” said the League’s newly-installed chairman Trevor Atkinson.
“The Executive discussed the issue at some length, and decided the sympathetic solution would be to still include Kenworthy in the awards process, although obviously Rank will be installed as the overall winner of the Championship wicketkeeping prize.
“These sort of confusions are usually caused by scorers filling in the fall of wicket as simply caught without putting a name to it, and these are the sort of things which we are aiming to improve and hopefully eradicate by the use of new technology.”
The League are currently on the look-out for a new sponsor to back the Paddock Shield competition.
The Second Elevens knockout competition has been supported by Spectrum Interiors for the last 13 seasons, and prior to that Paddock Kitchen Designs, but that deal has now come to an end, so the League are searching for a new sponsor for the start of the 2012 season.
