• Privacy policy
  • T&C’s
  • FAQ
  • Meet the Team
  • About The London Economic
  • Advertise
TLE ONLINE SHOP!
NEWSLETTER
SUPPORT THE LONDON ECONOMIC
  • TLE
  • News
  • Politics
  • Opinion
  • Business
  • Sport
  • Entertainment
  • Film
  • Food
  • Lifestyle
  • Property
  • Travel
  • Tech/Auto
No Result
View All Result
The London Economic
  • TLE
  • News
  • Politics
  • Opinion
  • Business
  • Sport
  • Entertainment
  • Film
  • Food
  • Lifestyle
  • Property
  • Travel
  • Tech/Auto
No Result
View All Result
The London Economic
No Result
View All Result
Home Politics

Could Yorkshire beat England?

By Jack Peat, Editor of The London Economic  The vote for Scottish independence seems to have raised a few eyebrows in God’s County. If a country that is less populous and has a relatively similar economic fabric wants to go at it alone, shedding the out-of-touch heart of England that is London, why shouldn’t we? […]

Joe Mellor by Joe Mellor
September 11, 2014
in Politics, Sport

By Jack Peat, Editor of The London Economic 

The vote for Scottish independence seems to have raised a few eyebrows in God’s County. If a country that is less populous and has a relatively similar economic fabric wants to go at it alone, shedding the out-of-touch heart of England that is London, why shouldn’t we? There’s 5.3 million marvellous souls in Yorkshire that share a common identity and almost patriotic pride in their county and there are endless reasons why a devolved Yorkshire could and possibly should work. But that’s a debate for another day; one disgruntled chunk of Britain at a time please!

Another similarly credible debate worth addressing is whether Yorkshire County Cricket Club, on the verge of clinching the top prize in the domestic game after a stellar season, could beat an England Cricket Team which has suffered miserably for the past year.

Under the guidance of first team coach Jason Gillespie and captain Andrew Gale Yorkshire have been transformed from struggling a Division 2 side into Division 1 title contenders, narrowly missing out to Durham last year and about to wrap up their first County Championship since 2001 with a win over Nottinghamshire.

The bottom-up approach championed under Gillespie has allowed young players to come to the fore and there’s now a host of talent within the squad, the fruits of which are only just being recognised on an international level. South Yorkshire-born Joe Root is the first name that will spring to mind after making his debut in the 2012 Test series in India, but since then 22 year-old Gary Balance has proved himself to be an integral part of England’s batting order and Liam Plunkett’s international career has been resurrected. And there’s plenty more to come from Yorkshire. Adil Rashid could be the answer to our spin problems and the prolific opening pair of Adam Lyth and Alex Lees have been tipped for Test honours, not to mention the likes of Jonny Bairstow and Tim Bresnan.

It all prompts the question; If Yorkshire were to play the remaining counties of England, who would win?

The most tempting angle to approach this from is how England would have fared without  Yorkshire players this summer. Of course, dealing in hypotheticals is a tricky business, particularly for a Yorkshireman that is perhaps getting carried away by our first County Championship since 2001, but I would contest that England’s woes could have turned into an all-out catastrophe were it not for its Yorkshire contingent.

RelatedPosts

PM ‘unrepentant and inveterate liar’ who will blame Brexit costs on Coronavirus, claims diplomat

Parliament to gift ornate lamps costing £175,000 for Queen’s Platinum Jubilee

PMQs 24th Feb – Starmer’s cautious but irreversible journey to the dark side

Brexit-backing Sunderland says it is not receiving same level of funding outside EU

The England batting order showed its fragility this summer and was bailed out (forgive the pun) on more than one occasion by the middle order. Gary Balance was recently described by Nasser Hussain as a fluent version of Jonathan Trott and Joe Root’s unbeaten 154 was the crux of England’s remarkable recovery in the first test which included a world record 10th wicket stand of 198. At the final test at the Oval Root also scored his fifth test century scoring an unbeaten 149 to help England post a first innings score of 486 all out in reply to India’s 148 all out.

Head-to-head is a less tempting approach to the big question. Yorkshire would certainly struggle, particularly against the bowling strength of England supplied by the likes of Jimmy Anderson’s fierce pace bowling and the ability of Stuart Broad to clinically dismantle a batting line up. But Yorkshire have a lot of strength in their battling order and Lyth and Lees could easily take a good stand before Root and Balance add to the total. What’s more, Yorkshire look far more like a team, the full package. It’s difficult to spot a weakness in the Yorkshire line-up whereas you can literally pick apart the England squad.

Realistically, an independent Yorkshire would fare pretty well against England as things stand. But hypotheticals aside, the truism that a strong Yorkshire makes a strong England will remain for some time to be the case. As Scotland gets all ‘up in Westminster’s jammy’ about independence on a political and economic level at least Yorkshire can be proud of our sporting achievements. Scotland have lost to Hong Kong and Ireland this year and although cricket may not be its strong suit – I’m sure they’d demolish Yorkshire at tossing sticks and curling stones on frozen lakes –  we’d still have them at athletics and if we can get Smudger back to form at MK Dons, shed a few pounds off Paddy Kenny and see if James Milner will come home we may even do them at football.

Remember, we got more medals than Australia in the Olympics. That’s as good as independence.

Since you are here

Since you are here, we wanted to ask for your help.

Journalism in Britain is under threat. The government is becoming increasingly authoritarian and our media is run by a handful of billionaires, most of whom reside overseas and all of them have strong political allegiances and financial motivations.

Our mission is to hold the powerful to account. It is vital that free media is allowed to exist to expose hypocrisy, corruption, wrongdoing and abuse of power. But we can't do it without you.

If you can afford to contribute a small donation to the site it will help us to continue our work in the best interests of the public. We only ask you to donate what you can afford, with an option to cancel your subscription at any point.

To donate or subscribe to The London Economic, click here.

The TLE shop is also now open, with all profits going to supporting our work.

The shop can be found here.

You can also SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER .

Support fearless, free, investigative journalism Support fearless, free, investigative journalism Support fearless, free, investigative journalism

Subscribe to our Newsletter

View our  Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions

Trending fromTLE

  • All
  • trending

What If We Got Rid Of Prisons?

Stress, fear and homelessness: The threat looming over families confronted with eviction

File photo dated 07/11/03 of a prison cell.

The Other Prison Pandemic

Latest from TLE

Lucky Numbers and Horoscopes for today, 25 February 2021

Image by AdobeStock

Weather forecast, alerts and UVB index for London, Thursday 25 February 2021

thunder ball results

Thunder Ball Results, Wednesday 24th February 2021

National Lottery Lotto Results – Wednesday 24th February 2021

About Us

TheLondonEconomic.com – Open, accessible and accountable news, sport, culture and lifestyle.

Read more

Address

The London Economic Newspaper Limited t/a TLE
Company number 09221879
International House,
24 Holborn Viaduct,
London EC1A 2BN,
United Kingdom

Contact

Editorial enquiries, please contact: jack@thelondoneconomic.com

Commercial enquiries, please contact: advertise@thelondoneconomic.com

SUPPORT

We do not charge or put articles behind a paywall. If you can, please show your appreciation for our free content by donating whatever you think is fair to help keep TLE growing and support real, independent, investigative journalism.

DONATE & SUPPORT

© 2019 thelondoneconomic.com - TLE, International House, 24 Holborn Viaduct, London EC1A 2BN. All Rights Reserved.




No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • News
  • Politics
  • Opinion
  • Business
  • Sport
  • Entertainment
  • Film
  • Lifestyle
  • Food
  • Property
  • Travel
  • Tech & Auto
  • About The London Economic
  • Meet the Team
  • Privacy policy

© 2019 thelondoneconomic.com - TLE, International House, 24 Holborn Viaduct, London EC1A 2BN. All Rights Reserved.