Yorkshire at 150: Elusive Championship title is a home delivery for Byas Elusive Championship title is a home delivery for Byas

A farmer whose hobby just happened to be cricket, Byas was a tough-talking disciplinarian who led the club to the 2001 County Championship – its first title for 33 years.

Not since the glory days of the 1950s and 1960s, when Yorkshire won seven Championships in 10 seasons, had they secured English cricket’s greatest prize.

But that all changed when Byas captained a side that put a smile back on the face of Yorkshire cricket.

“I take great pride in what we achieved that summer,” said Byas, whose team won nine of its 16 games to finish 16 points clear of second-placed Somerset.

“We had a great side and a lot of things seemed to come right that year. We’d been pushing hard for three or four years and the Championship was the culmination of that period. There was always a weight of expectancy on our shoulders playing for Yorkshire, always that pressure, so to win the title at last was a very special feeling.”

Byas’s script-writer certainly earned his corn that year as the captain himself took the title-winning catch.

That he did so at Scarborough, the ground where he played his club cricket, made the climax feel almost pre-ordained.

“It was one of the simplest catches I’ve ever taken, but the significance of it was huge,” remembered Byas, who caught Glamorgan’s Simon Jones off Darren Lehmann to clinch the title with two games to spare.

“You couldn’t have written it, to be honest; it was as though it was somehow meant to be.

“Twenty-five minutes later, it hammered down with rain and we’d have had to go off the field. I was lucky enough to score a hundred in that match so it was a wonderful way to win the title on a personal level.”

Byas, who scored 853 runs that summer at 44.89, with four centuries, led a superbly talented side.

Darren Lehmann topped the batting with 1,416 runs at 83.29, while Matthew Wood also passed the 1,000-mark.

Bowling-wise, Chris Silverwood and Richard Dawson each reached 30 wickets, the latter performing so well in the second half of the summer he was called up for the winter tour of India.

But the real star of the show was 23-year-old Steve Kirby, a heart-on-the-sleeve pace bowler plucked from the obscurity of Leicestershire’s second team to top the wicket-taking charts with 47 at 20.85.

“We needed a bowler with Matthew Hoggard away on England duty and the club brought in Steve,” said Byas.

“Nobody in the team had seen him before; the first time I met him was on the morning of his first match. But he bowled beautifully, aggressively and did really well. He was a lively character and took key wickets.”

Yorkshire’s victory was a true team effort.

Michael Vaughan also had a good summer, scoring 673 runs at 51.76 and finishing second in the averages to Lehmann; Craig White averaged over 40 with the bat and under 26 with the ball; Anthony McGrath, Gary Fellows and Richard Blakey scored important runs, while Ryan Sidebottom, Matthew Hoggard and Gavin Hamilton chipped in with useful wickets. But the unsung hero was coach Wayne Clark, who won the respect of the players and had a good rapport with Byas. A former Australian pace bowler, Clark was appointed following the resignation the previous winter of director of coaching Martyn Moxon, who went off to join Durham.

“It helped that Wayne came in from the outside,” said Byas. “It gave him a fresh perspective; he didn’t have any baggage. He didn’t know any of the players and was judging them from scratch. He didn’t bear grudges and took us as he found us.”

Clark’s method was simple but stunningly effective.

“He kept it very simple,” added Byas. “He didn’t confuse it; he just told us to play each session as it came. He was a great help to me and a very good ally.”

A month after the Championship was secured, Byas was gone. He was coming to the end of the road at the age of 38 but, not for the first time in Yorkshire’s history, a man who had brought success to the club was ushered on his way.

“I’d have loved the chance to defend the title, but that’s all in the past now,” said Byas, who went off to join Lancashire. “It was a phenomenal feeling to win the Championship, and it’s something no one can ever take away from me.”