A memorable County Championship finished in the most dramatic fashion, with Durham falling down the stairs and losing all their clothes while crashing out of Division One on the final day of the season. The Spin has picked her jaw off the ground, and dusted down the awards for a summer to remember.

The Richard III car park award for achievement

It was a bumper year for the unfancied East Midlands. Nottinghamshire knocked Surrey off their gilded throne in Division One, and Leicestershire dominated Division Two, promoted with time to spare. Neither county had been on anyone’s lips in April, in fact both had recently been bywords for slumming it. It was as recently as May 2021 that Notts ended a streak of 1,043 days without a Championship win; while Leicestershire were stuck in Division Two for 22 years, with eight wooden spoons festering at the back of the trophy cabinet. Yet at Trent Bridge and Grace Road, both charming grounds in their own way, captains Haseeb Hameed and Peter Handscomb quietly build teams that worked together and won together.

The sourdough starter award for a jaw-dropping entrance

To Tom Banton, whose pinch-yourself 371 against Worcestershire in the first match of the season, jetpacked him past Harold Gimblett, Viv Richards and Justin Langer to the highest Championship score in Somerset history. It was a moment to remember for a cricketer who admitted he had come to “hate” the game. If he only made 298 runs more in his other 16 first-class innings, consolation came in the Hundred and in his selection for England’s winter white-ball squads.

The Andy Burnham scene-stealing award

To big, smiling, Josh Tongue, who spent the whole of a desperate 2024 out with injury. During the penultimate round of the Championship, at the big-beast knockout of the season at the Oval, Haseeb Hameed switched Tongue to the pavilion end with Surrey needing just 46 more runs to win. Pounding in at over 90mph, bowling full of venom, he grabbed two Surrey wickets in one over and Notts went on to win by 20 runs. Tongue finished with five in the innings and 31 in a six-game season. Notts may never have him as on-hand again, and he made it count.

The Sliding Doors award for unfortunate injury

To Jordan Cox, who for the second time, missed out on possible Test selection after his body let him down. After breaking his thumb in the nets last November before he was about to make his Test debut against New Zealand, he then pulled an abdominal muscle against Somerset, while running his 99th run, and had to withdraw from the England squad to play Zimbabwe. Meanwhile, rival Jacob Bethell made his first international hundred and was appointed England captain for the tour of Ireland.

The Red Roses award for attendance

Come on, it wouldn’t be an awards ceremony if Surrey didn’t win something. The Championship wasn’t to be theirs this year –and the disappointment could be seen in technicolour all over Gareth Batty’s face when he spoke to the media – but the club once again flew the flag for the red-ball game. A 21st-century record of more than 80,000 people walked through the gates to watch Championship cricket, including 14,982 for the Festival of Red Ball cricket match against Essex. For all their many advantages of location and wealth, Surrey do the CC proud.

The Jamie Porter award for slipping under the radar

Spare a thought for Saif Zaib, who had the season of his life for Northamptonshire, but – somehow – still didn’t make the England Lions squad to tour Australia. He finished the season the highest run scorer in either division, with six centuries and seven half-centuries adding up to 1,425 runs, almost double the number of any of his teammates, and batted like an angel. May his winter gigs be fruitful.

The Keir Starmer award for progress

Lancashire and Kent, relegated at the end of the 2024 season, were favourites to hop straight back up again, Lancashire with all the might of a Test-match county, Kent under the guidance of new coach Adam Hollioake. It just didn’t turn out that way. Lancashire had lost captain Keaton Jennings and coach Dale Benkenstein by the end of May, the only team in the entire two divisions not to have won a match. Things were even worse for injury-plagued Kent, whose season nosedived and they ended up marooned at the bottom of the table, 29 points behind seventh place Northamptonshire. Roll on 2026.

The Luke Littler award for youthful endeavour

Take your pick from a fruitful basket. Somerset’s James Rew became the youngest man since Denis Compton to make 10 first-class hundreds. Hampshire’s Sonny Baker had the speed lovers purring. Glamorgan’s 21-year-old pairing of allrounder Ben Kellaway, purveyor of right arm and left arm off-spin, and batter Asa Tribe, were vital to Glamorgan’s promotion to Division Two. But the prize goes to Leicestershire’s Rehan Ahmed, still only 21, who made five delicious centuries, took 21 wickets at 19 and became the first England player since Ian Botham to grab a hundred and 13 wickets in the same game. All will travel to Australia with the Lions.

The HS2 award for decision-making

Has to go to the latest attempt to restructure the Championship. This perennial fun dragged on and on all summer, with various solutions concocted and dismissed, leaks and whispers, the PCA pitted against the counties. Those involved finally came up with something to put to the vote, a convoluted scheme that needed a three-paragraph explainer, and that only knocked one game – and, when the two additional One-Day Cup sweeteners had been added – two days off the schedule. The vote was tied 9-9, well short of the two-thirds majority needed. A furious PCA refused to rule out strikes, plotting restarted and the whole merry-go-round turned again.