Jason Gillespie gave a glowing half-term report to his Yorkshire charges as they reached the mid-point of their Championship season in second place in their battle for promotion.
As the first team coach left a rain-soaked Colwyn Bay ground on Saturday, Gillespie said: “To lose well over 1,000 overs by this stage is incredibly frustrating. When we have played we have been, by and large, outstanding this season and I’ve been really pleased by the attitude, desire and effort of all the lads.
“When we are getting on the park we are playing good positive cricket. The win at Bristol gave the guys a lot of belief and showed what could be achieved with a good positive mind-set.”
A total of 1,159 overs have been lost so far during Yorkshire’s Championship fixtures. That’s 37.47 per cent of the season gone from view and an unfortunate Colwyn Bay ground has borne the brunt of the worst of it.
When Yorkshire last played there in 2004 only 51 overs were played.
There has been improved drainage installed since, but the picturesque outground was never going to fend off the volume of rain, both from the sky and running from the hill at the Embankment End, coincidentally an area of land of which the grand old father of Yorkshire cricket, Lord Hawke, used to be a trustee.
This time around the umpires had the easiest of tasks on the final day with heavy overnight rain reducing the already saturated north Wales venue to a boating lake. The Tykes took four points from the drawn fixture and sit in second place in division two after eight matches.
The ever ebullient Aussie coach repeated his “we cannot control the weather” mantra, but even he had to add: “I do concede that it’s frustrating when we do miss so much cricket.
“Unfortunately when you play at outgrounds and the weather sets in it can be really difficult to get a full game in.”
A large number of supporters made the trip to north Wales and had Gillespie’s sympathy.
He said: “They’ve made the journey to Colwyn Bay and they’ve been denied any play.”
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