Middlesex County Cricket Club in 2005 played their cricket in Division One of the County Championship and Division Two of the totesport League. They started the season at 9-1 to win the County Championship title.
In their first fixture of 2005 they beat Nottinghamshire comfortably in a rain-affected Sunday League game, and followed it up with a rain-affected draw in the County Championship against the same team. The second Sunday League game saw a thumping win against Lancashire at Lord's. They were then defeated in the Championship by Warwickshire County Cricket Club, before defeating Worcestershire in the Sunday League on 1 May to maintain their 100% record in the Sunday League. Then on 4 May they beat Northumberland to progress to the Second Round of the C&G Trophy.
A defeat to Hampshire and a win against Gloucestershire then followed in the County Championship, before their unbeaten run in the National League was ended by hungry Hampshire Hawks. On 17 May they were eliminated from the C&G Trophy at the Second Round stage by Northamptonshire, and yet another one-day game without a win came at Gloucestershire, where rain ended the game prematurely. They then played a Championship game against Sussex, who just held on for a draw, leaving Middlesex seventh in Division One at the end of May.
Middlesex then lost a friendly match against the students of Cambridge UCCE, and also lost their table lead in the National League with a loss to Essex. The next Championship game was a high-scoring draw with Surrey, before keeping up their one-day title challenge with a win over Northamptonshire, taking revenge for their loss in the C&G Trophy. In a high-scoring match at Southgate, they beat Glamorgan despite losing more wickets, and on the same pitch the following day they amassed 314 to beat Nottinghamshire in the National League.
Middlesex also got good results in the Twenty20 Cup group stage, as they avoided the rain, but they lost twice to Surrey. They did have the fortune of meeting a dejected Kent side twice, beating them both times, and also beat Hampshire and Essex - enough to see them through to the quarter-finals on more wins. That was followed up by a seven-wicket win in the Championship over Hampshire, before their luck ran out, and they lost a high-scoring match to Gloucestershire in the National League before saying goodbye to the Twenty20 Cup with a 19-run loss to defending champions Leicestershire. A tour to Wales followed, winning the one-day game against Glamorgan in style before playing a Championship game on the same ground, which they also won comfortably.
August started with a three-wicket loss to Warwickshire, which saw them crash into sixth place in the Championship table, and another loss to Essex followed, this time in the National League. In the Championship, they set Nottinghamshire 530 to win on the fourth day at Trent Bridge, but that day was rained off, resulting in a draw. Then, Northamptonshire travelled to Lord's and beat Middlesex by 14 runs in the National League.
On 16 August, Middlesex travelled to Hove in Sussex, only to be slaughtered by their Pakistani imports. The match with Sussex was over inside two days and Middlesex were beaten by an innings and 232 runs, the highest margin of defeat suffered by any team in the entire Championship season. Then followed a four-day break, before they drew with Kent and Gloucestershire in quick succession. After August had given them no victories, September started brightly, as the recently crowned C&G Trophy champions Hampshire were defeated by two wickets. Their seventh Championship draw of the season, against Kent at Lord's, meant that their match with Surrey at The Oval on 21 September looked to be a relegation final, with the loser going down into Division Two.
However, there was also the National League to think about, and Middlesex won the first of two successive week-end matches before the Championship clash with Surrey, beating Glamorgan by five runs. The last one-day match of the season was also a win, a 44-run one over Lancashire, securing second place behind the dominant Essex. Their last match of the season was a Championship game with Surrey, and Middlesex needed to limit Surrey's point-gap to 14. After earning 5 batting points on the first day, and declaring to limit Surrey to two bowling points, Middlesex only needed one bowling point to secure continued presence in Division Two. Indian spinner Yogesh Golwalkar took the final wicket, and despite losing by an innings and 39 runs, Middlesex stayed up.
Famous quotes containing the words county, cricket and/or club:
“In the County Tyrone, in the town of Dungannon,”
—Unknown. The Old Orange Flute (l. 1)
“All cries are thin and terse;
The field has droned the summer’s final mass;
A cricket like a dwindled hearse
Crawls from the dry grass.”
—Richard Wilbur (b. 1921)
“The barriers of conventionality have been raised so high, and so strangely cemented by long existence, that the only hope of overthrowing them exists in the union of numbers linked together by common opinion and effort ... the united watchword of thousands would strike at the foundation of the false system and annihilate it.”
—Mme. Ellen Louise Demorest 1824–1898, U.S. women’s magazine editor and woman’s club movement pioneer. Demorest’s Illustrated Monthly and Mirror of Fashions, p. 203 (January 1870)