Graham Kelsey

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France’s Graham Kelsey tells us what it was like to umpire at the ECC Notts Sport® Trophy 2003

Was it to be the Dordogne or the Danube, St Astier-en-Périgord or Seebarn und Markommannenstrasse? With European tournaments taking place at the two locations during the same seven days in early August, the AFNEC (Association Française des Nompaires et Entailleurs de Cricket) President’s request for members to stand up and be counted didn’t make for an easy choice. However, knowing that the South-West regional association would certainly have no problems in finding a hatful of noble volunteers to umpire in the ECC U15-2^nd Division Championships being staged on the St Astier-en-Périgord ground this year, I decided to take the plunge and offer my candidature to participate in the umpiring of the ECC Trophy being organized, for the second time in succession, in Vienna by the Austrian Cricket Federation.

For those of you who don’t follow all the intricacies of European cricket and its various tournaments, the ECC Trophy, sponsored in 2003 by Notts Sport, is a biennial tournament for the European ICC Affiliate members, of which there are, at the moment, fourteen. Furthermore, as a part of the overall streamlining of cricket and its competitions, the winner of this year’s tournament would become the single Affiliate nation to go through and join the five Associate members in next year’s European Championships 2^nd Division, for an eventual position in a competition from which would be drawn a team to participate in the next ICC Trophy.

Twelve of the fourteen Affiliate members (all bar the Czech Republic and Cyprus) were due to contest the tournament but unfortunately Sweden withdrew in the run-up which caused all sorts of logistical problems for Tournament Director Richard Mockridge and the tournament’s chief organiser and statistician, the Austrian Cricket Association’s national secretary, Mike Bailey. Threes into eleven don’t go but then nor do fours either: indeed there isn’t much that does! It ended up meaning that all of the competing teams [Austria, Belgium, Croatia, Finland, Greece, Luxemburg, Norway, Malta, Portugal, Spain and Switzerland] got a free day at some stage during the tournament. Not so the umpires!

In the weeks before the tournament began I’d had the impression that we were going to be at least a dozen umpires, without including the two ‘supremos’, Graham Cooper and Ken Amos, from England. Even then I had quickly appreciated that with six games a day for at least the first three days, four or five thereafter, I wasn’t going to get much spare time. In fact, including Graham and Ken, we were just eleven so it was maybe just as well that Sweden had dropped out, leaving the opening schedule slightly less overloaded at only five games a day - thus ten umpires, at a match each (not including, of course, the “third umpire” slots which had us doubling up).

And then it was off. Down at seven o’clock - before if possible - for breakfast, on the bus at 7.30, and out to one of the two grounds. Used, as we are in France, to a capital with the barest minimum of cricketing facilities - despite its plethora of clubs and teams - the sight of the giant Seebarn ground was more than just a surprise. Nothing extraordinary - no stands, no Lord’s pavilion or Tavern bar, and certainly no hallowed turf - but two full-size cricket grounds side by side, roped off boundaries, the grass looking in a very decent state despite the scorched earth policy of early twenty-first century meteorology, and a raised-up pavilion overlooking the first, nearer, of the two grounds, the whole looking superbly picturesque in the rolling rural landscape of lower Austria. On that first morning there was just one game at nine o’clock but on most days two games were getting underway at that early morning start - an extraordinary treat for any lover of cricket.

I have to say that starting on such a schedule on the first morning I certainly felt that I’d been one of those to pull the short straw. It didn’t take long for me to realise that in fact it was quite the opposite. Umpiring in what was still the cool of the early morning and finishing a game at two o’clock was a lot better than arriving at midday and standing through the intense heat of the afternoon, which is what I then did on the Tuesday and Wednesday.

With all the umpires involved on a daily basis at one or other of the two grounds the first days flew past, fortunately with few hitches, but with precious little opportunity to talk about them had we wished, apart from the fifteen minutes snatched at breakfast. Virtually all the teams played a very good standard of cricket and most of the players were well aware of what constituted a sensible or plausible appeal so that discontent, in as far as the umpiring was concerned, was relatively limited. One has to add that, as befits a tournament of that stature, there was a disciplinary structure in place of which players, captains and team officials were all well aware.

On the Wednesday, after three days at the Seebarn ground, I had my first sight of the other ground being used, that of the Concordia Cricket Club known as ‘Markommannenstrasse’ after the name of the street alongside. If Seebarn was rather more than just a pleasant surprise, I have to admit that new Concordia ground (particularly when one appreciated just how quickly it has all been put into place - a matter of months) fairly took your breath away. A waste area, surrounded by lorry parks, high-rise blocks and warehouses, had been turned into an extraordinary urban cricket ground in little more than a matter of weeks through the hard work and dedication of a small group of enthusiasts led by Austria’s Cricket Development Officer, Siva Nadarajah. For him it was a childhood dream come true: a full-size cricket ground, protected all around by 5 metre-high fencing, a small pavilion in one corner, a scorebox in another, nets in the third, plants and shrubs planted all around the perimeter, and now an interest-free loan and a project for a new, grander pavilion, always with the full support of the local municipal council. Magic.

It was, however, on the deliberately named ‘Concordia’ ground that my own one moment of ‘discordia’ throughout the week arose. I’ve always found judging LBWs fairly low-key affairs, but the nick which is caught behind, or a bat-pad, can sometimes be a bit less than evident. Strangely, however, on this occasion I had absolutely no doubt at all: ‘Not Out’. I guess I must have been the only person on the field, batsmen apart, who thought that way, and mid-on, mid-off, cover, and all points square of the wicket were rather more than adamant in claiming that I was … and, what’s more, wrong! A very tight game fought very hard by both sides finally finished with said team losing, with just an over and two wickets to go, and feeling very aggrieved - a sentiment with which I could quite easily empathise after so many decades playing the game (not that that helped them much).

As for the actual competition, on the second and third days I’d umpired the Norwegian team, first in a match against Spain and then in another against Belgium, and on both occasions I’d come away feeling that it would need an exceptional effort to beat them (though in a spectacularly brilliant innings the Belgian opener Shahid Mohammed had very nearly provided that in cracking eighty runs in half as many balls). In the all-rounder Zeeshan Ali (Player of the Tournament) they had a cricketer of considerable class, whilst the opening bat Shahid Mahmood and the opening bowler Amir Waheed were both excellent cricketers. Unbeaten all week, they met Greece in the last of the top games on the final day, in what then became a sort of final. Excellent bowling by the Greek team - the only one that I didn’t get to umpire - ensured that the Norwegians could never break free, and the target, of just over two hundred, was always - even at eight wickets down - ‘on’, although at the death the Norwegians held their nerve and won through.

A game a day then, for the first six of the seven days, with three “third umpire” slots thrown in for good measure, two of them on the last day - when I ended up standing in for the designated umpire anyway. I’d been lucky enough to catch a sniff of what professional umpiring is about and I’d found it interesting, motivating, invigorating and, yes, tiring!