ICC News
Nick Pink Farewell
On the 14th March I start a new
opportunity as Chief Executive of
England Golf and it brings to an
end a very enjoyable four years
with the International Cricket
Council.
Christmas Challenge 2015
For the third year in a row we received 48 entries for the
challenge, and a most commendable 17 submitted all-correct
solutions. Twelve of these entries came from readers of
Notchers’ News, and the remaining 36 from ACO members.
Solution
Notchers’ News
Scratchers
2
167
1
I would like to thank the ECB
ACO and fellow Board members
for their tremendous support to
me and the ICC Europe region
over the last four years. Umpiring
and scoring across the continent
continues to improve and the ability for us to integrate
with the education and professional development
offered to the European officials by our colleagues in
England has really helped to strengthen the game.
The hard work and commitment to officiating from
those within the game never ceases to amaze me and
as a former club cricketer, I am ashamed to admit that
you take for granted the preparation and dedication
that umpires and scorers have to manage matches
and help get the game on. I have seen this first hand
and it has been a great privilege. I will be watching
with interest as the latest innovation continues to
improve opportunities for more and more to access
our great game.
All the best to you and I will be watching with real
interest as officiating develops in this country.
Caption Competition
Once again, the Christmas Caption Competition was
well supported. Thank you to all the entrants. The two
winning entrants (both coincidentally from Surrey) are
shown below:
Caption A
Chris Herd, Surrey
‘Umpires are always distracting
scorers; this time by
blinding him with his watch.’
Caption B –
(partially awarded
for obscurity!)
Steve Hodge, Surrey
I believe I'm right in saying that
in late 1962 Frank Ifield was
number one in the hit parade,
for many weeks, with ‘I
Remember You’.
Unable to dislodge him sat
Chris Montez at number two
with ‘Let's Dance’. May I
suggest the following lines
from that song as a suitable
caption for B:
‘Do the twist or stomp or mashed potato too,
Any old dance that you wanna do,
But let's dance.’
32
2
7
7
3
6
0
4
116
13
5
4
7
6
27
5
7
10
55
8
1
4
9
108
8
10
0
3
11
5
5
3 (or 2)
9
Extras
Total 289 (or 288)283
Result: Notchers’ News won by 6 (or 5) runs
One question caused the third umpire to reconsider his
original solution. When he set the question for Notchers’
extras, ‘For how many of the umpires’ signals is the umpire
required to repeat the signal after the ball is dead?’, he
expected the answer of two (no ball and wide ball); however,
the large majority of entrants included dead ball as well. His
thinking was that the ball was already dead when the first
signal was made and so did not meet the criteria he had
intended, but, on consideration, he realised that those who
included ‘dead ball’ were entitled – and correct – to do so.
Since the umpire’s decision is final, he has decided to allow
either answer.
As usual there were a few questions which caused more
difficulty than others, although in each case there were more
people who produced the right answer than the wrong.
Scratchers 4 produced the most wrong answers (14), with
almost all the defaulters giving the answer 12 – rather than
the correct 13 – for the number of overs the young bowler
would have to wait before they could bowl again from the
same end.
The ‘eventful over’ gave some problems in Notchers’ 4 (7
errors), 6 (11) and 7 (10), where I would guess that the
problem was careless calculation rather than ignorance of
the law. Scratchers’ extras (10 errors) was the only other
question to produce more than six mistakes, while there
were only two questions which received correct answers
from everyone.
The successful entries were sent in by Tushar Agarwal, John
Betts, Peter Danks, James Emmerson, Fred Godson, Sheila
Harding, Frank Hodgkiss, Martyn Holloway-Neville, Keith
Healey, Keith Horsley, Stewart Orrock, Garry Rank, Robert
Ridge, Steven Smith, George Temporley, Paul Toplis, Mike
Turner and Richard Verrinder.
The ACO winner was Stewart Orrock.
As always I give my thanks to all those who sent in an entry,
especially those who included friendly and appreciative
comments.
John M Brown
Third Umpire
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