The sword of Damocles hangs threateningly over the heads of several Yorkshire players who have not been up to scratch this season, but no such worries exist for Michael Lumb or Steven Kirby, who have both been sporting their newly-acquired county caps at Scarborough this week.

It is, perhaps, a sign of the times that neither Lumb nor Kirby was born in Yorkshire, but the pair of them were just as proud to receive their caps as any native would have been.

Little significance is attached to the awarding of caps at some counties these days, but the tradition still holds strong in Yorkshire and it remains the ambition of every youngster on the club's books to be able one day to pull on a sweater with those distinctive bands of Oxford blue, Cambridge blue and gold.

Caps have to be earned and are not given away lightly - as Kirby so shrewdly observed after grabbing career-best figures of 13-154 against Somerset at Taunton a few weeks ago.

Asked if he felt he should have received his Yorkshire cap by now, Kirby replied: "If I turn in one or two more performances like this one then perhaps they will consider it."

At Cheltenham in the last away match, Kirby bagged another ten wickets and finally convinced Yorkshire that he was worthy of being given senior status.

Although 'over the moon' with his cap, the Bury-born paceman still had good reason a few days later to be disappointed to learn that he would not be collecting his first England cap in the current Test against South Africa at Trent Bridge.

So hot has been Kirby's form that up to this week he had grabbed 38 Championship wickets in his last five matches and now could have been the ideal time for England to have slipped him in.

After the caning they took in the first two Tests, England were badly in need of a lippy bowler with plenty of menace and Kirby would have fitted the bill.

Of all the players in Yorkshire's long and colourful history, none made a more sensational debut than Kirby when he was signed in the middle of the Kent match at Headingley in 2001 as an emergency replacement for Matthew Hoggard, who had been plucked out of the game by England.

Kirby, who had just been released by Leicestershire where he played for the Seconds, shocked Kent in the second innings by glowering, glaring and staring his way to figures of seven for 50, the best ever recorded by a Yorkshire bowler on his first-class debut.

He proved this was no fluke by snatching 12-72 against Leicestershire soon afterwards and since his dramatic arrival he has led the field by some distance as Yorkshire's top wicket-taker.

The Yorkshire roots of Lumb, of course, go very deep indeed, with Michael's dad, Richard, from Doncaster, being capped in 1974, and his great grandfather being the founder of the Joe Lumb Trophy which is still competed for today by talented youngsters around the county.

Richard formed with Geoff Boycott one of the most successful opening partnerships in Yorkshire's history and it was only because Richard and his South African wife Sue were in Johannesburg during the winter of 1980 that Michael was born over there and not over here.

When Richard retired from Yorkshire cricket in 1984 the family settled in Johannesburg and the young Michael grew up so immersed in the game and so naturally gifted that he went on to represent South Africa in the Under-19s World Cup.

But the family decided he would better be able to further his career in England rather than South Africa and Richard arranged for him to have a couple of seasons on trial with Yorkshire Seconds while he qualified as an English player.

Michael's promise was obvious and he made his Yorkshire debut against the Zimbabweans at Headingley in May, 2000, when he showed glimpses of his potential with an unbeaten 66 in the second innings while wickets fell around him.

The following year he was able to launch his Championship career.

Since then he has never looked back and he and Matthew Wood have this season held the often fragile batting together on many occasions, Wood finally winning the race between the pair to be the first in the team to 1,000 first-class runs.

A few weeks' ago, Michael learned that he had been shortlisted for a place at the new ECB Academy at Loughborough this autumn and if the classy left-hander goes on progressing at his current rate then, like Kirby, he will surely add an England cap to his Yorkshire one.

Updated: 11:19 Saturday, August 16, 2003