The MInor Counties Championship 1900

4 THE MINOR COUNTIES CHAMPIONSHIP 1900 INTRODUCTION This book contains the match scores, a statistical survey and full averages, both by county and by player in alphabetical order, for the sixth season of the Minor Counties Championship. It follows the same format as the previous ACS publications that covered the first five years of the competition. THE LEAD UP TO THE 1900 COMPETITION Once again, the main issue facing members of the Minor Counties Cricket Association after the 1899 season was how to facilitate the arrangement of fixtures so that more minor counties and county second elevens could take part in the competition, and that consequently it could be fairly described as providing a more accurate reflection of the relative strength of minor county cricket. As part of this process, it was desirable to get to a situation where it was no longer necessary to rely on including fixtures that counted as championship matches for one side, but not the other. In 1899, eleven counties had arranged sufficient fixtures - four home and away matches - to qualify for the Championship. This number compared with seven in both 1895 and 1896, ten in 1897, and nine in 1898. Also in 1899, there were two counties who played less than 8 matches against counties in the Championship but whose games had counted as championship matches for their opponents. In 1895 there had been seven such counties, in 1896 five, and in both 1897 and 1898 six. The December 1899 Annual Meeting The Annual Meeting was held at Lordís on Tuesday 5 December1899, prior to the annual gathering of county secretaries to arrange the first-class fixtures for 1900. Those present were L C R Thring and R Waller (Bedfordshire), W O Nares (Berkshire), P J de Paravicini and G R Ward (Buckinghamshire), O Papworth (Cambridgeshire), R H Mallett (Durham and Hon Secretary of the Minor Counties Cricket Association), Col J Fellowes (Devon), J H Brain (Glamorgan), Dr J Earl Norman (Hertfordshire), E G Buxton and L G Buxton (Norfolk), P W Dale and A P Darnell (Northamptonshire), F G H Clayton (Northumberland), H M Turner (Oxfordshire), H W Gardner and Rev P E Mainwaring (Staffordshire), A M Miller (Wiltshire) and J B Wostinholm (Yorkshire 2nd XI). Audley Miller was elected to chair the meeting. The main agenda items related to the classification of counties, the related issue of the establishment of a second-class county championship, additional teams participating in the competition, and neutral umpires. The Classification of Counties - Some rules had been drawn up relating to the alteration of the classification of counties and these had been put to the MCC who were seeking the views of the first-class counties before coming to any conclusions. The proposals were firstly that the second-class counties should be defined as those counties not competing in a first-class counties championship and the second elevens of first-class counties, and secondly that there should be no limit to the number of first-class or second-class