Top award secret is all set to be revealed
which, in this 125th anniversary year, is again being held at the Cedar Court Hotel.
Lady Sykes Candlesticks winners Grant Jones (Delph) and Martin Kilner (Cumberworth) will also be honoured at the event.
Former England and Hampshire spinner Shaun Udal is the chief guest (6.15 for 6.45).
League president Donald Earnshaw will oversee the function, at which prizes for the 2017 season will be handed out and when comedian Lester Crabtree concludes the entertainment. An off-spin bowler and lower-middle order batsman, Udal played his first game for his home county Hampshire at 20 in 1989.
In 1994 he was drafted into England’s ODI squad, against the touring New Zealand side, making his international debut alongside Darren Gough. In that game he dismissed Adam Parore and Ken Rutherford, and consistent performances against South Africa at the end of the summer gained him a place on the 199495 Ashes tour.
However, injury forced him home early, and he had to wait until November 2005 before finally making his Test debut in Pakistan at the age of 36.
Initially overlooked for England’s subsequent Tests in India, he was called up for the final match at Mumbai, and stunned India’s batsmen with a haul of four for 14, including Sachin Tendulkar, as England squared the series.
At the end of the 2010, Udal retired from first-class cricket having taken over 800 wickets and scored almost 8,000 runs. MARK Stoneman admits his first hundred in England colours has come against opponents who can provide only limited preparation for the imminent Ashes series ahead.
Stoneman posted England’s first century on tour, in their third and final warm-up match, on day two against an inexperienced Cricket Australia XI at the Tony Ireland Stadium.
The opener’s 111, and halfcenturies too for back-in-form Alastair Cook (70), captain Joe Root (62no) and Dawid Malan (57no) eased England to 337-3 in reply to 250 all out.
Facing the same hosts they beat in Adelaide last week, there was an element of men against boys thanks to a lack of first-class pedigree as yet in an opposition line-up made up of promising youngsters who are not required by their Sheffield Shield teams.
After Stoneman had followed three successive 50s at the start of his maiden Ashes tour with a 140-ball century, he said: “Obviously, it’s been welldocumented and everyone is critical of the opposition we’ve faced. It feels like my game is in good order. (But) it’s going to be tested a hell of a lot more come next week, that’s for sure.
“There’s no doubts about that, and everyone is aware of it. Obviously, there’s going to be more pace and bounce in the attack and the pitch at Brisbane.”
England will fly south on Sunday for next week’s first Test, and Stoneman indicated he and his fellow batsmen are having to ready themselves as much if not more in net practice as the middle for the examination ahead at the hands of Mitchell Starc et al.
“It’s up to the individual to take that practice a bit further, knowing that what we face in these games isn’t going to be the level we get next week,” he added.