THE prime movers behind the switch to a summer season would have been allowed a wry smile this week.

The decision to return the Northern Ford Premiership to the warmer months has never won the full backing of the traditionalists.

But Boxing Day's several postponements - most notably the controversial late call-off of the York versus Hunslet game - provide the latest nail in the winter rugby coffin.

The details surrounding the South Leeds Stadium stoppage were well-documented in the Evening Press but, leaving the controversy aside, the whole carry-on has given further backing to the decision to switch to a summer term.

All but one of the Boxing Day matches failed to beat the frost, meaning five matches will have to rearranged, and no doubt many more matches will follow suit in January and February, as usual.

The cost of postponements is not small, especially for the many Northern Ford Premiership clubs who already have tight budgets, while the episode on Wednesday saw dozens of York fans make the 30-mile trip to South Leeds Stadium to be rewarded with nothing more than a journey home.

Luckily, Hunslet is one of the nearest away grounds to York and, in this case, the costs of the Boxing Day call-off will hit Hawks' pockets harder than Wasps', but who's to say a match at Huntington Stadium this winter won't suffer a similar fate? And what if the visitors had set off from Cumbria, for example?

They are the same old arguments, but if you look at this season, poor Oldham have only played one game so far for one reason or another, and we are now in the fifth week of term. Tuesday's visitors to York, Swinton, have only played twice.

The good thing this year is that it is a long season to help the NFP make that switch to summer rugby, meaning there should be opportunity to squeeze rearranged fixtures into empty weekends, rather than having to play midweek.

But as the season began in December rather than in the new year so that clubs would not have to go too long without gate receipts, any more postponements in these winter months could deem that early start pointless.

THE Boxing Day postponement denied the new-look Wasps team the chance to mark a little piece of history.

Boss Leo Epifania was set to name the exact same starting line-up as that which took on Batley Bulldogs in their previous Northern Ford Premiership encounter.

And, believe it or not, it would have been the first time since May 2000 that the club had named the same XIII for two consecutive matches.

The last time was 19 months and 40 matches ago.

Coincidentally enough, the second of those games was also against Hunslet, the previous game having been at Sheffield a week earlier, on May 14.

The starting line-up on those occasions was: Andy Preston, Dean Thomas, Simon Irving, Andrew Lambert, Matt Woodcock, Mark Cain, Craig Robinson, Craig Forsyth, Alan Pallister, Steve Hill, Mick Ramsden, Andy Hill, Chris Judge.

Mark Cain has since left and returned to Wasps, while the only other survivors still at the club are Alan Pallister and Mick Ramsden.

The starting line-up set to play on Boxing Day was: Ben Sorbello, Matt Mulholland, Shaun Austerfield, Carl Hall, Gavin Molloy, Jon Liddell, Mark Cain, Andy Precious, Peter Edwards, Michael Docherty, Leigh Deakin, Mick Ramsden, Rob Lee.

The substitutes on Wednesday were different to those against Batley. Indeed, you have to go back to July 1999 for the last time Wasps sent out the same XVII for two consecutive games (against Swinton and Workington). However, on that occasion the starting XIII were not the same.

For the record, Wasps have never fielded the exact same XVII (wearing the same numbers) since four subsitutes were first allowed, in 1996.