Leicestershire County Cricket Club

[Walshy5]

So what is the difference between our pitch and Surreys then? Why aren't they under investigation? It's purely because that's  Surrey and we're Leicestershire! Worst part about it is they're not even trying to hide that it's corrupt! Shameless!

[everton carr]

14 hours ago, Mark 'expert' Lawrenson said:

Looking bleak, this is a must win game for us. 
In the words of Basil Fawlty “the games up”

And soon to be the words of the Major Hampshire won

[The whole world smiles]

Bare in mind Yorkshire got a 48 point deduction for decades of rascim makes 27 seem especially harsh for 1 bowling friendly pitch. 

[when_you're_smiling]

Remember the last time we would have qualified for the T20 knockouts we were deducted points as well.

 

I’m really annoyed about the suspended points as well. Basically encourages teams to complain about the pitch if they lose as Glamorgan did.

[Mark 'expert' Lawrenson]

10 hours ago, SemperEadem said:

As someone on twitter stated - The report doesn't reflect well when you read it on Leicestershire, didn't dispute it was a poor pitch and Head Groundsman basically said it wasn't his decision and felt like he couldn't push back to Henderson and Thomas.

 

 

There is no doubt that Thomas and Henderson control everything down to the pitches they play on, Thomas in particular is a control freak. 
This is on the 2 of them and as you say it doesn’t reflect well on the club that an employee with many years experience isn’t comfortable or is unable to push back on two people who have far less experience in pitch preparation particularly in the UK.

That being said it’s a extremely harsh punishment for us and has probably been that harsh to try and nip the interference in the bud and protect the HGM in the future. 

Edited yesterday at 06:52 by Mark 'expert' Lawrenson

[Beagle]

44 minutes ago, everton carr said:

And soon to be the words of the Major Hampshire won

And to further quote the Major, the ECB are “Bad eggs! All of them!” But unlike Basil Fawlty, we won’t “forgive and forget “! 

[Officer Doofy]

49 minutes ago, The whole world smiles said:

Bare in mind Yorkshire got a 48 point deduction for decades of rascim makes 27 seem especially harsh for 1 bowling friendly pitch. 

This just makes me want to give the whole thing up if im honest.

 

Modern sport can go and **** itself. Everything is ruined. 

Edited yesterday at 07:13 by Officer Doofy

[Mark 'expert' Lawrenson]

34 minutes ago, when_you're_smiling said:

Remember the last time we would have qualified for the T20 knockouts we were deducted points as well.

 

I’m really annoyed about the suspended points as well. Basically encourages teams to complain about the pitch if they lose as Glamorgan did.

Aaron Lilley if I remember correctly 

[billyfox1]

1 hour ago, Walshy5 said:

So what is the difference between our pitch and Surreys then? Why aren't they under investigation? It's purely because that's  Surrey and we're Leicestershire! Worst part about it is they're not even trying to hide that it's corrupt! Shameless!

As far as I understand it's because Glamorgan put in an official complaint which warrants the investigation. Yorkshire didn't complain.

 

[Officer Doofy]

12 minutes ago, billyfox1 said:

As far as I understand it's because Glamorgan put in an official complaint which warrants the investigation. Yorkshire didn't complain.

 

Surely it should be the match referee 

[Mark 'expert' Lawrenson]

All games around the country have their own independent match referee present. 
It doesn’t matter how a pitch played somewhere else as there are so many factors involved in pitch preparation. 
A pitch must meet a certain criteria and uneven bounce from day one of a four day game is a definite red flag and coupled with the seam movement led to the pitch being rated as poor. 
A game going all four days and players scoring 90+ in the second innings rightly or wrongly are not considered when it comes to the final pitch mark under the ECB pitch criteria. 
Im assuming no other counties had their pitches marked below average or poor by the match referee present so there is no charge to be made. 
As I’ve said before it seems an incredibly harsh punishment though and I feel for the groundstaff as they are instructed by the DOC and the head coach when it comes to preparing pitches. 

Edited yesterday at 08:03 by Mark 'expert' Lawrenson

[Golden Fox]

8 hours ago, sm1 said:

We got an extra 8pts (reduced from 16) in addition to the 19pts we got for winning the game. It's complete BS, the game lasted 4 days with almost 800runs scored. 

Thanks - but those point deductions aren't actually mentioned anywhere in the tribunal's decision! Was that deduction from a separate body, or does it just go without saying all those points were deducted? As you say its BS anyway and feels like picking on 1 pitch from the whole summer

[SemperEadem]

You do feel for the groundsman in all of this.

[Super_horns]

46 minutes ago, SemperEadem said:

You do feel for the groundsman in all of this.

Yes dealt a tough hand not able to work on the pitch .

 

https://www.reuters.com/sports/cricket/blazing-sun-bollywood-leicestershire-docked-points-poor-pitch-2026-09-17/

[MaidstoneFox]

I wonder if there will be any internal fallout from this? Given Essex's results, two draws in these last two games could have kept us in division 1. While I think the penalty is exceptionally harsh, the report suggests a bit of a breakdown in communication and intent. Can that be repaired?

[Officer Doofy]

The absent CEO needs to pull her finger out. 

[Mark 'expert' Lawrenson]

2 minutes ago, MaidstoneFox said:

I wonder if there will be any internal fallout from this? Given Essex's results, two draws in these last two games could have kept us in division 1. While I think the penalty is exceptionally harsh, the report suggests a bit of a breakdown in communication and intent. Can that be repaired?

I really do hope so. It’s one of my bug bears in life that managers with less understanding/experience in a specific area can instruct someone with vastly more knowledge how to do their job.

Cricket is terrible for it, the groundsman will have been told what to do (albeit nobody would have wanted uneven bounce)

Fons is a strange character and along with Claude has to take responsibility for this disaster.

Hopefully we will win at the weekend and get another trophy under our belts. 

[The whole world smiles]

2 things can be true at the same time the punishment can be unbelievably harsh/unjust and the club can also have made a right pigs ear of this. 

[when_you're_smiling]

What I don’t understand is that the report acknowledges that the uneven bounce (which supposedly got better on the last day when it was presumably at its driest) was because of cracks forming due to the ‘unprecedented’ dryness. Even Glamorgan’s evidence is about how dry it was.

 

But the argument for the points deduction is that Leicestershire left the grass too long - 16mm rather than the up to 14mm the groundsman would have preferred. It says Leics should have foreseen problems with that extra grass, but it doesn’t actually say that contributed to the uneven bounce which is its reasoning for the ‘poor’ rating. At most the ECB groundsman is mentioned as saying longer grass leads to more moisture extraction. At no point though does the report mention how much of an impact the extra 2mm would have made on the dryness. I’m not an expert, but then presumably neither is the person who wrote the report as it doesn’t mention how much of a difference it would make.

 

Ultimately the report absolutely jumps on that discrepancy between the club and groundsman as a reason to hit the club hard, even though it acknowledges the dryness was the ultimate reason for it. I’m sure that dryness is the reasoning behind so many low scoring matches in this block of Champ matches, no matter how long they left the grass.

[MaidstoneFox]

19 minutes ago, when_you're_smiling said:

What I don’t understand is that the report acknowledges that the uneven bounce (which supposedly got better on the last day when it was presumably at its driest) was because of cracks forming due to the ‘unprecedented’ dryness. Even Glamorgan’s evidence is about how dry it was.

 

But the argument for the points deduction is that Leicestershire left the grass too long - 16mm rather than the up to 14mm the groundsman would have preferred. It says Leics should have foreseen problems with that extra grass, but it doesn’t actually say that contributed to the uneven bounce which is its reasoning for the ‘poor’ rating. At most the ECB groundsman is mentioned as saying longer grass leads to more moisture extraction. At no point though does the report mention how much of an impact the extra 2mm would have made on the dryness. I’m not an expert, but then presumably neither is the person who wrote the report as it doesn’t mention how much of a difference it would make.

 

Ultimately the report absolutely jumps on that discrepancy between the club and groundsman as a reason to hit the club hard, even though it acknowledges the dryness was the ultimate reason for it. I’m sure that dryness is the reasoning behind so many low scoring matches in this block of Champ matches, no matter how long they left the grass.

Isn't there something about the grass being too long and therefore it was more difficult to see all the cracks. If that hadn't been the case then more water may have been added. So the root (no pun intended) cause of the issue is the request for 16mm of grass, which the HGM said he wouldn't have done.

 

There was also the point about clumps of grass, which needed raking more. I know nothing about pitch preparation, but I'm assuming this may have been done with shorter grass.

Edited yesterday at 09:36 by MaidstoneFox

[Tommy Fresh]

Don't think it's particularly weird for Thomas etc to have a say on how they want the pitch, and ultimately it's them that come out looking the tits for us getting a deduction.

[MaidstoneFox]

28 minutes ago, Mark 'expert' Lawrenson said:

I really do hope so. It’s one of my bug bears in life that managers with less understanding/experience in a specific area can instruct someone with vastly more knowledge how to do their job.

Cricket is terrible for it, the groundsman will have been told what to do (albeit nobody would have wanted uneven bounce)

Fons is a strange character and along with Claude has to take responsibility for this disaster.

Hopefully we will win at the weekend and get another trophy under our belts. 

Sounds like the HGM can't challenge the wishes of Henderson/Thomas, despite his superior knowledge, which isn't a good situation going forward. Maybe the previous HGM would have dug his heels in a bit more, but this guy has only been in the job a year.

 

Without stereotyping too much, South Africans can be a blunt in their communication style. Doesn't apply to all of course.

[when_you're_smiling]

7 minutes ago, MaidstoneFox said:

Isn't there something about the grass being too long and therefore it was more difficult to see all the cracks. If that hadn't been the case then more water may have been added. So the root (no pun intended) cause of the issue is the request for 16mm of grass, which the HGM said he wouldn't have done.

 

There was also the point about clumps of grass, which needed raking more. I know nothing about pitch preparation, but I'm assuming this may have been done with shorter grass.

Well the ECB head groundsman said ‘the whole pitch was visibly cracked’ and Carlson said ‘the pitch was clearly cracked’, so not sure it could be argued the extra 2mm covered it.

 

You’re right on the clumps, but don’t remember seeing that mentioned as being an issue for the bounce.

[when_you're_smiling]

According to the BBC, the players were told of the deduction at lunch yesterday. 

[Lionator]

Deliberately relegating us is scum behaviour