Yorkshire CCC youngsters step up to plate to solve the crisis

Kept off the field until August 1, with two-thirds of the campaign claimed by the virus, they embarked on a whistle-stop schedule of five four-day games and 10 fixtures in the T20 Blast.

The combined return was six wins, five defeats, two draws and two abandonments.

Yorkshire won the Bob Willis Trophy North Group – which replaced the County Championship as a one-off competition – with an unbeaten record of three victories and two draws.

The draws were affected by the weather and cost Yorkshire the chance of reaching the final (their points total was eclipsed by the other group winners, Somerset and Essex).

Yorkshire struggled again in the T20 Blast, where five defeats were offset by three victories and the two abandonments previously mentioned.

They finished second-bottom of the North Group to extend to four years their non-appearance in the knockout stages, although the loss of four key players for the last four fixtures, after T20 captain David Willey tested positive for Covid-19 (also ruling out Matt Fisher, Josh Poysden and Tom Kohler-Cadmore, with whom he had come into contact socially) was unfortunate to say the least.

The campaign, in a nutshell, can be summed up in one sentence: Yorkshire played well in the BWT (not unexpected given that four of the six clubs in the North Group were in the Championship Second Division) and were unlucky not to qualify because of the weather, and they were inconsistent in T20 albeit hampered by the loss of several key players.

Given a full season (and a full complement of overseas players, whose contracts were necessarily cancelled due to the pandemic), it is reasonable to speculate that Yorkshire would have been strong contenders in the Championship and that they would have bucked the trend in T20, too.

Alas, it is purely speculation and we will never know how Yorkshire’s class of 2020 would have fared under normal circumstances.

They say that every cloud has a silver lining, and the positives to emerge from a difficult situation were plain to see.

Had Yorkshire possessed a full complement of players, and had the squad not suffered injuries at various stages, would we have seen the likes of Jordan Thompson come to the fore, the 23-year-old all-rounder who impressed especially in red-ball cricket?

Thompson has reasonable claim to be considered Yorkshire’s find of the season, perhaps their player of the season, an all-action batsman, bowler and fielder of great heart and skill.

Would we have seen fellow youngsters such as George Hill, Dominic Leech, Matthew Revis, Jack Shutt, James Wharton, Tom Loten, Ben Birkhead and Sam Wisniewski take to the field, all of whom gained valuable experience? Some of them, perhaps; all of them, no.

Of course, one should not expect too much too soon from the youngsters, who were thrown in at the deep end due mainly to circumstance.

If Yorkshire are to end what will be a six-year wait for silverware in 2021, it is essential that the experienced campaigners lead by example and do the bulk of the heavy lifting.

As such, the club will be heartened by the instantly favourable impact made by Dawid Malan, the batsman they signed from Middlesex in November, who was their leading scorer in the BWT and who made a brilliant double hundred against Derbyshire.

Adam Lyth was typically solid in both tournaments, while Joe Root could hardly have done more in his five T20 outings –both in terms of his contribution to the team (four half-centuries in five innings, seven wickets and tremendous energy and enthusiasm) and also in showing the public at large that he has plenty to offer in the 20-over format.

Ben Coad remains a quality performer with the new ball; Matthew Fisher ditto (how Yorkshire need both men to have better luck with injuries). Duanne Olivier looked better for having had last season under his belt. Steve Patterson remains Steve Patterson – Mr Reliable. Although Tom Kohler-Cadmore did not quite have the season he would have wished, he is a top-class batsman in all formats.

Other good signs included the ongoing development of batsman Harry Brook, who played some of the most aesthetically-striking innings of the season, the T20 form of batsman Will Fraine, and some typically busy contributions with the bat from keeper Jonny Tattersall, who perhaps just needs that first Championship century to really kick on.

The signing of spinner Dom Bess bodes well for the future (assuming that England do not whisk him away too much), but Yorkshire could do with the return to full health of batsman Gary Ballance, and they remain grateful for any chance to field Root, Jonny Bairstow and Adil Rashid, the latter having not worn the White Rose for 17 months.

In the final analysis, it was a season that everyone was pleased to see the back of, a season that looked unlikely at one stage and which proceeded in the surreal atmosphere of no spectators.

May we never see another one like it again.

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Thank you, James Mitchinson. Editor.