Booth hangs up his boots.

Byline: David Lockwood ,

One of the Huddersfield League's most successful cricketers of the last two decades has decided to call it a day!

Paul Booth has chosen to ring down the curtain on a cricket career which has brought him countless accolades and trophies in the Drakes League, as well as county fame with Yorkshire and Warwickshire, and not forgetting two separate spells in the Bradford League.

The left-arm spinner, who has also been a prolific run-scoring middle order batsman has enjoyed 18 seasons at Meltham, and played a massive part in the Mean Lane club's record-breaking achievements in the 1990s, when they hoisted the Sykes Cup four years in succession and the League championship four times in five seasons.

He made his county debut for Yorkshire in 1982 during the six-wicket victory against Derbyshire at Scarborough, and spent seven years on the county staff, during which time he formed a close friendship with fellow spinner Ian Swallow before both were released by Yorkshire in 1989.

Booth, then 24, was offered a two-year contract with Warwickshire, while Swallow went on to Somerset. But both were to be reunited at Meltham in the 1990s, the latter taking over the captaincy of the Mean Lane club.

The Huddersfield man also enjoyed spells with Farsley and Cleckheaton in the Bradford League, but it was with his home village club of Meltham that he made such a masssive impact.

He made his first team debut at Golcar, on May 29, 1982 and proceeded to take 951 wickets in his 18 seasons at Meltham, along with 8,182 runs for an overall average of just short of 30.

Some of those of course, were truncated seasons due to his county commitments. In the 1990 season for instance, he batted only five times, while in 2003 he missed half the summer due to injury.

The most successful seasons were in 1995 and 1996 when he took 96 wickets and scored 796 runs, followed by 103 wickets and 672 runs respectively.

Booth's first bowling victim at Meltham was Alan Stancliffe from Armitage Bridge, on June 5, 1982, while his last victim was Linthwaite's Ian Hirst last September.

His best performance with the ball was a nine for 29 return at Shepley in 2002, while 10 years previous he recorded his highest batting tally, making 114 at Honley, one of two tons in his Drakes career.

But it was his consistency which earmarked him as an outstanding player, passing the half-century mark 47 times, while with the ball in hand he had an incredible 62 five-wicket returns or better to his name. And he picked up 98 catches just for good measure.

His list of league credits is immense, dating back from his first season in the league in 1982 when he won the Reg Haigh Trophy for the most promising young cricketer of the year.

Three times he has lifted the Jack Gledhill Trophy for the League's best all-rounder in 1992, 97 and 99, while he is the only player in the history of the Huddersfield League to lift the bowling prize in three consecutive seasons from 1997.

And when it comes to the big occasion, like the Sykes Cup final, Booth has always risen to it, playing a massive role in each of Meltham's five Cup-winning teams.

In his first-ever final in 1992 against Kirkheaton, Booth claimed six for 49 which won him the man-of-the-match award in the 63-run win.

The following year it was Booth again making the final headlines with four for 61 and 24 runs to claim his second successive match award in the 17-run victory over Elland.

In 1994 he had to bow to skipper Swallow, despite his own five for 45 haul in the four-wicket triumph over Skelmanthorpe, but he swiftly took back the Joe Robinson award 12 months later from his skipper when he claimed six for 37 and took the man-of-the-match trophy during the nine-wicket mauling of Honley.

And the spinner's fifth and final winners' medal came in 1997 when he took a couple of wickets in the Thongsbridge innings, and then partnered Swallow in a decisive third-wicket stand of 58 which turned the game in Meltham's favour as they went on to win by five wickets.

"I always felt I wanted to retire before I started to lose my game," said Booth, who will still be only 40 in September.

"I never wanted go on so long that I began to go downhill and was no longer able to play the way I know I can."

Now he is intending to turn his focus to golf - he is a member at Crosland Heath - and the `ex-Meltham' all-rounder is determined to get down to a single figure handicap by the end of this summer.

There have been, and will continue to be many players who have played cricket longer in the Huddersfield League - but few will have made such an impact and have as many entries in the League's handbook as Paul Booth!