– Drainage under scrutiny as ODI is abandoned
LEEDS, England, CMC – Not even a newly installed drainage system could salvage West Indies’ plans of a quick rebound from their Test series hammering, as heavy overnight and morning rain forced the abandonment of the opening One-Day International against England yesterday.
The torrential rain left the outfield at Headingley saturated and despite brilliant sunshine for much of the afternoon, umpires Nigel Llong and Steve Davis ruled that the ground was unfit for play and abandoned the match just after a 3 pm inspection.
Despite the best efforts of groundstaff, water remained on certain sections of the field forcing umpires to take the obvious decision.
The abandonment will be a huge setback for West Indies who would have been hoping to redeem themselves with a strong performance in the three-match series.
Yorkshire County Club, who play their cricket at Headingley, installed a £600 000 ultra-modern drainage system at the ground late last year which was supposed to guard against downpours like that which occurred yesterday.
Instead, the club’s chief executive Stewart Regan was left trying to defend the apparent failure of the system following the abandonment that provoked boos from the impatient spectators.
“The groundsman Andy Fogarty, says we would have called this match off a long time ago had we still had the old drainage system,” Regan said.
“Work started in September, and we moved the last match of last season to Scarborough so we could start early.
“We wanted to lay the turf in early March, but we lost three or four weeks because of the weather.
“Every contingency was in place and the turf was laid in time for the season. We were happy with it and the ECB was happy with it.”
He added: “The issue here is two torrential downpours meant the water couldn’t drain away quickly enough.”
West Indies would have been looking forward to action, following their heavy defeats in the two Tests over the last fortnight.
They lost the opening Test at Lord’s by 10 wickets inside three days and also lost the second Test at Chester-le-Street by an innings and 83 runs.
The tourists will now head to Bristol for the second ODI on Sunday before playing the final match at Edgbaston next Tuesday.
Regan said while he understood spectator disappointment, there was nothing that could have been done.
“We’re all disappointed that the match hasn’t been able to take place. Nobody likes upsetting spectators,” Regan said.
“But we’ve had some very unusual circumstances: torrential rain on a newly-laid surface.
“We’ve got everything in place that we need to have in place. The weather forecast was for sunshine. Nobody was expecting the downpour we’ve had.”
“What we can’t control is the weather, so I don’t think anything can possibly be laid at the door of the club. We’ve done everything we possibly could have done.”
