Yorkshire Win 25 Championship Matches — 1923 Season

Yorkshire had won the title in 1919, 1920 and 1922. The 1923 side was reinforced by the maturity of George Macaulay's off-spin and the consistency of Sutcliffe and Holmes at the top of the order.

Yorkshire's 1923 season was the second of their four consecutive Championship titles (1922-25). Captained by the amateur Geoffrey Wilson, the side fielded a settled XI across the season — Sutcliffe and Holmes opening, the captain at three, Maurice Leyland at four, the bowling of Wilfred Rhodes, George Macaulay, Emmott Robinson and Roy Kilner taking 700 wickets between them.

The team won 25, lost 2 and drew 5 of their 32 Championship matches. Their points percentage of 89.7 has not been matched in a full Championship season since. Across the year Macaulay took 166 wickets at 14.3, Robinson 138 at 16.4, Kilner 135 at 16.0 and Rhodes 117 at 12.2 — four bowlers each taking 100-plus wickets, the first time any county had achieved this since the Championship structure stabilised.

The 1923 season is considered the high-water mark of Yorkshire county cricket. The team finished the year having scored 16,800 runs and conceded 11,200 — a points percentage that the longest-serving Championship statisticians regard as the strongest county record of the inter-war era.

“We were a side that knew how to win every match. We did not concede draws as some counties did; we played to win even when the weather was against us.”

Yorkshire won the title again in 1924 and 1925, completing the four-in-a-row. Lancashire took over with three consecutive titles 1926-28. Yorkshire's next Championship victory was in 1931.