Barnsley Woolley Miners captain Jason Booth says the Shaw Laners have had an 'excellent' season after finishing eighth in their 12-team league.
Their final game of the season at home to Hallam was rained off, leaving them in the same position as last year but with six more points and one more win.
They won six of their final nine matches after a tough start to the season which saw them spend several weeks in the relegation zone as they struggled with various issues.Oliver Jackson left the club to return to Conisbrough early on when he was the leading wicket-taker while overseas star Harpreet Singh missed the first six matches of the season after being involved in the Indian Premier League. They also missed openers Jon Trower and Matt Wilson for almost the entire campaign due to injury and unavailability while all-rounder Nathan Firn was out for ten matches due to two breaks of his hand.
Booth said: "When you look over all of that, and bear in mind the side is very young and still learning in a very, very competitive league, the season has been a real success."If I was going to use one word to sum it up, it would be excellent. To be level or above a lot of clubs who have had no disruption to their team is a massive achievement."I think we would have been a lot higher up all things being equal, but they weren't equal. I am ultra positive and I think it has been an absolutely brilliant season."
Barnsley are now hoping to sign an opening bowler, spinner and top order batsman for next year while they are considering whether to bring Singh back for next season.The Indian has been a star player but is likely to be involved with the IPL again next year which could see him miss the first two months of Barnsley's season.
Booth said: "With the standard of the league getting higher and higher, you need an overseas player if you are going to achieve anything. But it could be very difficult to achieve anything apart from avoiding relegation if we don't have our overseas for the first five or six games of the season or maybe more."
Harpreet finished with the second best batting average in the division, 53.77, and his tally of 699 runs put him top of Barnsley's charts and fourth in the league. He also took 28 wickets which put him third on the club's list behind Dan Waldron with 32 and Ali Jahangir with 40.Wicket-keeper David Hunt took the most dismissals of all the stumpers in the division in his first campaign with the Shaw Laners.
