THE FAMOUS Civil War battle of Bovey, re-enacted a few years ago by the Sealed Knot society, was probably a picnic compared to Friday night's annual general meeting of Bovey Tracey Cricket Club.

The occasion at the Dolphin Hotel should have been one of pride and great satisfaction at Bovey's achievement in winning the Premier Division of the Devon Cricket League championship last year, for the first time in its 152-year history.

Instead, it resulted in the surprise resignation of the chairman George Gribble, and the unopposed election of vice-chairman Nigel Mountford to succeed him, after an acrimonious and potentially disastrous row about Mr Gribble's chairmanship and the 'win at any cost' culture that he is said to have encouraged.

By the end of the evening, many of Mr Gribble's supporters – including several members of the first eleven – had also withdrawn their committee nominations, and had walked out.

The spark that lit the blue touch paper was the issue of Mr Gribble's payments to players, particularly Ian Bishop, the former Somerset and Surrey pace bowler who played a key role in Bovey's winning season.

Other committee members, including the treasurer, Ronnie Elphick, said that they had not known of the payments until December's committee meeting.

The 'roundheads', to continue the Civil War comparison, included Mr Mountford, club secretary Geoff Coish and Mrs Elphick. They were determined to rein in what they saw as the 'cavalier' and arrogant behaviour of Mr Gribble and his supporters.

The Gribble camp – the cavaliers, if you like – including his son Mark, the captain of the first eleven, and leading player Jeremy Christophers, hit back, arguing throughout the evening that Mr Gribble had done nothing wrong.

The club had achieved glory under his leadership, rising to the heights of the club game in Devon. Mr Christophers said that the Gribble era would be seen as the Golden Age of Bovey Tracey's cricketing history.

'We are not arrogant,' he said. 'But we are proud of our achievements for the club, for the team and for our chairman. Why shouldn't we be?'

At the end of it all there were no bodies left lying on the floor of the hotel function room, but any follower of the Sealed Knot who was present would have learned a great deal about the bitterness of civil war.