While Darren Gough and Gavin Hamilton were meeting The Queen at Buckingham Palace yesterday, their Yorkshire colleagues were huddled in the pavilion at Derby as a storm swept the ground, causing a blank first day in the PPP Championship match with Derbyshire.

Torrential early morning rain was followed by another thundery burst, leaving umpires Chris Balderstone and Barry Duddleston with no option but to call it off for the day at lunchtime.

Not that it would have made any difference to his plans, but Yorkshire skipper David Byas was unaware at first of a fax sent to the ground from Lord's pointing out that counties could pick their World Cup players if they wished and let substitutes stand in for them until they arrived from the Palace engagement.

With teams not having been exchanged, Yorkshire were entitled to call up Gough and Hamilton for today, but Byas said: "I am very happy with the 12 players I have got here already and do not think it necessary to displace two of them at this stage. In any case, Darren is suffering from a bit of shin soreness and a couple of days rest will give it time to clear up. Gavin will also return and obviously changes are going to have to be made to accommodate them but that decision does need to be taken until after the present game at Derby."

Byas said that he had not been able to look at the pitch, which remained well covered yesterday, but he did not rule out the possibility of all-rounder Gary Fellows coming into the side for the shortened game rather than being made 12th man.

Meanwhile, Yorkshire will be taking extra measures to try to ensure that spectators who come on to the field at the end of Sunday's Super Six World Cup match at Headingley between Zimbabwe and New Zealand do so in an orderly manner. They want to try to avoid a repeat of the scenes when the ground was invaded after Australia's game with Pakistan last Sunday week.

"Someone sooner or later is going to break an arm or a leg if they keep charging on," said Yorkshire chief executive Chris Hassell. "It is very difficult to stop people coming on but we will have extra stewards around the perimeter near the close to try to stem the flow."

About 2,000 tickets are still available for the match and these can be bought either by credit card or by paying at the gate. Prices are £60 or £36.

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