FOULRIDGE have pulled their second team from the Craven League due to a lack of players.

The Lancashire club’s representative Fred Brooker-Carey said: “We hoped to have some players from another club but that is not happening now.

“It only leaves us with 16 senior players and we are in a bit of a Catch-22 situation with regard to junior players.

“We have used players in the past from Colne’s junior teams and we want to play young lads in our second team, such as we did with my son Chris, but they are so young at the moment that the ECB will not allow them to play for us.

“The idea now is for us to form a link with the primary school in Foulridge and form an under-11 team, but it will still be another two or three years before they are ready for second-team cricket.

“As for having a second team again for the 2022 season, it is a work in progress.”

The departure of Foulridge means that Division Three will have only 11 teams.

As the fixtures have already been published, it has been decided that whichever team was due to play Foulridge on a given Saturday will instead receive a walkover.

Meanwhile, the date of the Cowling Cup final at Airedale has been moved back three weeks from Sunday, August 1 to Sunday, August 22.

“We have a few committee members who are unavailable on August 1,” explained Airedale’s chairman Tim Crossley.

In future, the league’s child welfare officer and any club child welfare officers will be known as league safeguarding officer and club safeguarding officer in order to take note of their wider roles.