Going from bad to worse
by Paul Barker, 11th October 2006

Several extremely controversial measures where brought up at the Bassetlaw and District Umpires Association A.G.M. which was held at Worksop Cricket Club. The meeting was opened by the chairman Mr. Bernard Jarvis who asked for a minutes silence in memory of a well respected umpiring colleague, Mr. Keith Mansbridge who passed away recently. Once that was observed Mr. Jarvis asked the Secretary Mr. Peter McKenzie for the minutes of the last A.G.M. and these were taken as read.

With no matters arising from these minutes Mr. McKenzie then gave his annual report, which centred mainly on the need for more umpires to officiate the matches. Mr. McKenzie stated that the situation was now reaching critical status and urged members to do their best to persuade people to take up the role. He also stated that training courses for would be umpires are held all around the catchment area and all are well attended but it didn’t seem to be swelling the numbers available.

There was then an extremely pleasing presentation to Mr. Dennis Smith who has served the league as an umpire for some 35 years. Mr. McKenzie stated that his long service placed him in second place behind the legendary Ken Tuck in the amount of year’s service given.

Mr. John Leaning the Umpires Appointments Secretary then read out his annual report and stated that only 89 umpires are now registered with the league of which usually only around 70 are available most weeks. He thanked Mr. David Chambers of the Lincolnshire League who had helped by providing some umpires from that league when available and had volunteered to help next season.

Mr. Leaning then said that from next season with the shortage of umpires clubs who provided umpires would be given preference over those who didn’t. When asked from the floor did that mean Division 1 matches would not be staffed, Mr. Leaning said that would not be the case, but could give no assurances that from Division 2 downwards some matches may well have no umpires at all! He also said that if teams in the lower echelons of the league provided umpires they would be given preference over teams in a higher section who didn’t.

Mr. Jim Garton the Bassetlaw and District League Chairman spoke with proposals from the league to be presented at the A.G.M. in November. These measures where to try to recruit umpires and could be said at the very least to be highly controversial. Clubs who were not supplying umpires to the league would be asked for an annual subscription per team of £75.00 and if they had managed to recruit the desired number of umpires throughout the season they would then be eligible to a discount of £50.00 per team at the end of the season.

Any team relegated from the Nottinghamshire Premier League would be placed straight in Division 2 if they could not supply the necessary umpires towards the pool!

Mr. McKenzie then read out the financial report for the year and stated that things hadn’t looked too good at the start of the year but had recovered substantially as the year went on.

The President Mr. Mike Smedley then presented 20-year service ties to Geoff Randle and Gerry Graney and then presented the Joe Richardson Memorial Trophy also to Mr. Graney for his sterling work for the association on the committee and also as training officer over many years.

A ballot was held between eleven delegates for ten places on the committee and the elected members were Messrs. Alan Bennett, Mick Bonsall, Brian Cartwright, Ervin Devney, Gerry Graney, John Heaman, Geoff Holden, Tom Munro, John Penrose and Brian Rivington.

Mr. Nigel Plews then gave a short talk on his experiences in the game before the proposed rule changes of the association and proposals for the league A.G.M. were discussed. The first proposal was for a change in the Umpires Association rules and stated that meetings could be held on other dates rather than Saturday’s. This was carried unanimously.

Of the proposals to go before the league management committee a proposition that a two point penalty be placed on clubs whose captain does not return the Umpires Assessment form by post or e-mail within four days of the match taking place was turned down.

Another proposal that Umpires expenses be raised for the first time in three years was accepted and another proposition that the expenses for the 20/20 Mallen Trophy matches be standardized was accepted.

Mr. John Heaman and the chairman Mr. Bernard Jarvis then talked of the success of the Umpires Assessment scheme with Mr. Heaman stating that over the first 50% of the season and after several phone calls the system had a 96% success rate. The second half had a 79% success rate.

Mr. Bernard Jarvis then closed the meeting.