Successful tour ends and season awaits

Yorkshire's pre-season tour to Barbados has proved a successful exercise in team bonding and all of the boxes that needed ticking seem to have been marked positively.

(PHOTO: Tino Best pops down to Banks CC to catch up with Anthony McGrath and his former team-mates)

Rain has affected a few of the latter matches but not dented spirits as the squad returns to the UK with a confident spring in its step. In the final match of the tour, an inter-squad 40-over friendly, it was a Brophy XI against a Sayers XI, but several rain delays led to the coach setting the Sayers XI a target of 152 (calculated by the Chalky White method!)

The Sayers XI triumphed by 5 wickets with 5 balls to spare.

It was great to see Anthony McGrath with bat in hand. He had said he wouldn't play on this trip so hopefully his return to the field shows he is ahead of schedule as the season approaches.

The squad returns to a 2-day match against Leeds Bradford UCCE on Monday and Tuesday (29 & 30 March) and a 2-day intersquad friendly at Headingley Carnegie on 4 & 5 April before the season proper gets underway at New Road, Worcester on 8 April.

BROPHY XI

BATSMAN			Runs	Balls	Mins	4	6	SR
G Ballance	c Arthur	b Patterson	13	18	21	1	0	72.22
M Nurse	retired		42	49	80	4	2	85.71
R Pyrah	c Lee	b Hannon-Dalby	28	54	73	1	1	51.85
G Brophy (*)	not out		27	35	45	1	0	77.14
D Wainwright	not out		23	24	31	2	0	95.83
A Rafiq
J Greene
A Lilley
R Sidebottom
M Ashraf
J Blain
Extras		(4w,3lb,1b)	8
TOTAL			141-2

Bowler	O	M	R	W	Wd	Nb	SR	Econ
O Hannon-Dalby	7	0	30	1	3	0	45.00	4.29
S Patterson	6	1	18	1	0	0	36.00	3.00
J Lee	6	0	27	0	1	0	-	4.50
L Hodgson	5	0	29	0	0	0	-	5.80
G Randhawa	6	0	33	0	0	0	-	5.50

SAYERS XI

BATSMAN			Runs	Balls	Mins	4s	6s	SR
J Root	c Brophy	b Lilley	36	31	48	5	0	116.13
J Sayers	lbw	Sidebottom	2	7	13	0	0	28.57
A McGrath	c Brophy	b Lilley	22	32	45	2	0	68.75
L Hodgson		b Wainwright	8	11	16	1	0	72.73
R Wiggins		b Ashraf	40	34	40	3	2	117.65
R Arthur	not out		32	28	38	4	0	114.29
J Lee	not out		0	0	4	0	0	-
S Patterson
G Randhawa
O Hannon-Dalby
C Reifer
Extras		(nb2,w6,lb3,b1)	12
TOTAL			152-5

BOWLERS	O	M	R	W	Wd	Nb	SR	Econ
R Sidebottom	3	2	3	1	1	0	19.00	1.00
M Ashraf	5	0	40	1	0	0	30.00	8.00
A Lilley	5.1	0	26	2	2	0	16.50	5.03
J Blain	3	0	29	0	1	1	-	9.67
D Wainwright	4	0	20	1	1	0	25.00	5.00
A Rafiq	4	0	30	0	1	0	-	7.50