Cleveland County are now officially the Eastern Counties champions. It was a very interesting series, but in my opinion, there are two issues that are holding the Eastern Counties Cup back from being even bigger and better.

First off, let me say as the coach of Cleveland that I am very proud of my team for their achievements and I am very thankful of our fans for their support. They have been magnificent, from the first game, right to the last.

Last Saturday’s victory against Flatts was bittersweet and I do mean “bitter” and “sweet”. While my team did what I asked of them, which was to show their dominance, it was sad to see a Flatts team minus the services of a Kevin Hurdle and a few others who could have possibly played, but were deemed ineligible.

Issue 1: the Eastern Counties Cricket Association has a rule that if you play for a team for two years in league cricket, you become eligible to play. However, if after you become eligible, you leave the club at any time and play for another club, you automatically lose your eligibility.

Here is a scenario: let’s say Hurdle played league cricket for two years at Flatts. The third year he would be eligible to play for Flatts in the Eastern Counties Cup. He then goes on to play another five years for Flatts in the competition, but in the sixth year, he decides he wants to go back to Western Stars and play league cricket. The way the ruling is now, Hurdle would not be able to play for Flatts in the Eastern Counties Cup the next year because, by moving to a different team, he automatically loses his eligibility even though he has played that many years.

So a person is eligible for life only if they are born within the boundaries or lived there for two years or more. Take me, for example. I lived in St David’s for two years, so I am eligible to play in the competition. Once I became eligible, I left and moved to Paget.

How is that any different to a player playing at a club and moving on to another club? Is it not pretty much the same thing? So what can a player do to beat the system? They can say, “Let me get my mail sent to an address within the boundaries so that in two years I can become eligible.” They would have mail there that dates back to two years, so how can one prove them wrong? They can’t!

My point here, though, is this: once a player has played for any club in the Eastern Counties Cup, he should automatically be able to play for the team for the rest of his life and here is the reason why. Go back to the Hurdle scenario. Because he left and went to another club, he is ineligible to play for Flatts and can never play again unless he qualifies again just like any new player would have to do so. So, basically, it is as if you had never played before.

However, if Hurdle decided he wanted to go play for St David’s in league cricket and played there for two to three years, is he eligible to play Eastern Counties for them? A resounding “No!”

The regulations say that once you play county cup for one team, you cannot play for another team, even though you have lost eligibility for the first team. Does that make sense?

My second point is that I feel open cricket should be just that — open cricket. If we are making rules for the betterment of cricket, then open cricket should have no limitations and bowlers should have to learn to think batsmen out. However, if we want to make this game crowd-friendly, whereby there is a result every game, then play limited overs.

In the Eastern Counties Cup, we play 118 overs a day, so what harm would it be to play a 60-overs match? It is only a mere two more overs. It is still a long version of the game, but one thing you are guaranteed is a winner, unless the match is rained out. To make it fair, you would have to use the Duckworth-Lewis method for rain-affected matches.

Other than those two concerns, I feel Eastern Counties is continuing to grow. Besides Cup Match, the county matches still draw the biggest crowds.

This year represented a changing of the guard, as Cleveland produced the upset of all upsets by defeating a strong St David’s team. What will next year bring? It cannot come fast enough.

Quote of the week: “If better is possible, good is not enough”

— Benjamin Franklin