Lancashire League Handbook 2019

16 SECRETARY’S REPORT 2018 In 2018 we welcomed a new sponsorship with J W Lees, who have had a long association with the Central Lancashire and Pennine Leagues, with an initial 3 year deal. The deal provides a development element of which a number of our clubs have benefited from in 2018. In 2019 we will see the introduction of Umpires jackets and stumps, both bearing the sponsors logo. We look forward to a long and lasting partnership with the company. The League met its goal of expansion to 24 Clubs with Crompton, Littleborough, Middleton, Milnrow, Norden, Rochdale & Walsden admitted at the Annual General Meeting. The next step of the expansion was to divide into two divisions of twelve and for promotion and relegation between the two to start at the earliest opportunity. Clubs therefore agreed that in 2018 teams would play each other just once. This led to a season with competitive and meaningful cricket right up until the last games of the season in all three divisions and this meant that there were many outstanding individual performances along the way. In the Professional ranks there were eleven SouthAfricans, five Sri Lankans, four Pakistanis and four home based English signings. The annual Ron Singleton Colne Trophy was an early victim of the weather with no play possible and the League took the unprecedented step of postponing the first set of fixtures as the majority of grounds were unfit for play. The rescheduling of these fixtures was much debated and eventually they were played in August. The season managed to get under way the week after and three of the new Clubs, Norden, Rochdale and Walsden started with victories albeit with two of the fixtures bringing head to head games between the new entrants. Reigning Champions, Clitheroe started with a win over Rawtenstall with a target set by the newly introduced Duckworth Lewis System. The weather, as the season developed, meant that use of the DLS system was limited and when it was required we had a few teething problems. It is a system which we need to educate, scorers, captains and Umpires on and once further training has been held, along with practical use, it will become more widely appreciated by all. Walsden went on a run of 14 consecutive wins and finished the season with 20 wins 2 no results and just the one defeat against Darwen in their nest to last game of the season. They won 6 matches by over a hundred runs and a further 8 by 7 wickets or more on their way to their first Lancashire League title. Josh Gale was undoubtedly the star man and he scored 817 runs with 2 hundreds and 6 fifties. In support, Jake Hooson made 770 runs with one century