Minor Counties Championship 1914

Norfolk – Mr C B Leathes Prior Northumberland – Mr S P Bell Staffordshire – Mr P Briggs Surrey (2 nd XI) – Mr A W F Rutty Wiltshire – Mr R W Awdry Yorkshire (2 nd XI) – Mr R W Frank The following counties were not represented:- Cambridgeshire, Cheshire, Cornwall, Devon, Monmouthshire and Suffolk. It was decided to continue to select twenty umpires but no reserves were nominated. The following umpires were selected:- NORTH MIDLANDS SOUTH B Brown T Attewell H Barrett W H Caldow C Marshall A E Hoar S Doughty A C McArthur T H Holton T Fenwick G Perkins C Hughes W H Harden G J Rye G L R Hutchings M Myers J P Whiteside E Merrifield S Wrigley W Smith The only changes were that T Fenwick (of Sunderland) took the place of C Gregory in the North group and H Barrett (who had been engaged for several seasons at Oxford) and W Smith (the Wiltshire professional) replaced C E Brown and F Johnson in the South group. Both umpires are known for just 24 of the 67 matches in which play took place in 1914, with just one of the umpires being identified in two other matches. Of the twenty umpires chosen, only G Perkins and A E Hoar are not known to have stood in at least one match. No umpires who were not on the panel were known to have stood in any of the matches. THE 1914 MINOR COUNTIES CHAMPIONSHIP The Counties Involved All the 20 counties that contested the Championship in 1913 competed again in the 1914 season and they were joined by Essex 2nd XI, who made their debut. The Championship again consisted of a single table. The possibility of a Challenge Match was retained, with the team ending in second place being allowed to challenge the team finishing above them providing that the two teams had not met during the course of the season. The Championship The rush toward the Great War played havoc with the 1914 Minor Counties Championship. Many amateurs hurried to join up or found their short-term plans in disarray, leaving their counties unable to field elevens that were even remotely close to their strongest. Some counties quickly gave up the struggle relatively early and cancelled all their remaining fixtures. The first match to be scratched was that between Devon and Dorset, which had been scheduled for 5-6 August, and the second would have seen Dorset play Buckinghamshire on 7-8 August. As an indication of the severity of the problem, when the fixture between Buckinghamshire and 6