Television personality Piers Morgan believes them to be ‘spineless, cowardly bunch of pathetic numpties’ while former England and Glamorgan opening batsman Steve James ‘hope they realise what a mistake they have made’.

Carew are used to making the headlines, but even they wouldn’t have envisaged how their declaration in the final game of the season against Cresselly would have gone viral all around the globe at such a pace.

It took a week for the world to know of Abraham Lincoln’s assassination, two hours to learn of JFK’s and around the same time for news to spread globally of Carew declaring in a game that promised so much but delivered so little.

Starting off locally, the story was soon picked up by the national press. It even made headlines in Australia and India.

Carew may have won the title, but they lost a significant amount of friends.

The league was shaping up nicely, Carew were 21 points ahead. A winning draw or a close losing draw would have sufficed. A win would have guaranteed it, but very few had the vision to predict they could lose the game yet still win the title by ensuring Cresselly didn’t pick up enough bonus points to overhaul them.

Whatever you think of Carew’s actions, it was a creative way of ensuring the title was theirs even if they didn’t put up much of a fight.

As one person on Twitter commented: ‘100% brains 0% bottle’.

While the declaration sparked immediate outrage, some people believe it was their right to do given they had led division one for the majority of the season and that Cresselly invited them to bat thus opening the door for them to do what the did.

They acted within the laws of the game if maybe not the spirit.

Cresselly possess a powerful batting line-up and by inviting Carew to post a score they were giving themselves the best chance to win the game by putting Carew under pressure to deliver.

Such is their quality with bat in hand they would have been confident of overhauling anything Carew set. The statistics prove this, they finished the season having scored 405 more runs than their nearest rivals.

Carew didn’t see it that way. They batted for just over two overs, scored 18 runs and on losing their first wicket promptly declared.

By doing so, Cresselly couldn’t claim any bonus points awarded for every two wickets taken and every 30 runs scored until the score reached 150, thus allowing five batting bonus points.

Cresselly then came out to bat knowing they would win the game, but were powerless to win the title. It was an empty, hollow victory in stark contrast to any win over Carew that has gone before.

Soon after and Carew were presented with the trophy amid condemnation of their actions.

Both clubs released statements, with Cresselly believing Carew’s tactics were ‘at odds with their title of champions of the county.’

Carew refused to comment amid the media coverage adding ‘We stand together’.

On Wednesday evening, the Pembroke County Cricket Club Executive Committee met for their annual monthly meeting. Hoping they would just be able to discuss mundane matters at the end of a good season, instead other topics came to light and the game at Carew was on the agenda.

Releasing a statement, they said: “In the county executive monthly meeting at Haverfordwest, the game between Carew and Cresselly was discussed and will be investigated further by the executive committee.”

It’s a slightly ambiguous statement, but one that suggests the kerfuffle over the declaration won’t end yet.

It will be interesting to see what happens from here.

The drama at Carew overshadowed drama elsewhere in the league and at the bottom end of division one Kilgetty had to win at home against Lawrenny and ensure they gained more points than Johnston at Pembroke to survive.

They didn’t. Lawrenny scored 91-2, easily overhauling Kilgetty’s 90 all out.

Pembroke lost at home to Johnston, being restricted to 129-7, with the Tigers passing it for four wickets down, while Whitland lost at home to St. Ishmaels, therefore allowing Tish to leapfrog them to finish fourth.

Carew seconds beat Llanrhian away after losing two wickets in passing Llanrhian’s 92 all ou.t. Narberth, starting the day in second place and therefore favourites to join Llangwm in getting promoted, lost at Stackpole, the win securing the Lilies’ position in division two for next season.

Stackpole scored 188 all out, Simon Bevan hitting 51, while Narberth were all out for 175, Marcus Adie taking 5-37.

For Narberth, Ben and Kyle Quartermaine scored 67 and 62, respectively, while Ben Hughes took 3-24.

Prior to the game at Burton, Saundersfoot youngster Tom Mansbridge was presented with the Thomas Carroll Pembroke County Cricket League Player of the month award for August, but he was unable to prevent Burton from winning, the win helping them overhaul Narberth into second spot.

Burton hit 220-7, while Saundersfoot were 135 all out.

At Llechryd, the home team’s firsts lost to Whitland seconds, although the win didn’t help them avoid relegation, the Borderers going down with Llanrhian.

Meanwhile, as Cresselly firsts were winning yet losing at Carew, their seconds enjoyed a final day win over Hook.

Hook were top leading into the final game, Cresselly were third behind Herbrandston, but such was the closeness of this division that the win allowed Cresselly to end up as champions.

Hook were all out for 139, Simon Cole, Neal Gregory, Sion Jenkins and Lyn Richards all taking two wickets each.

Cole then hit 52 and Neal Williams 32 to seal the win and the trophy.

Lamphey beat Pembroke Dock by six wickets after the Dock hit 121 all out, while there was an excellent game at Lawrenny where the home team’s seconds hit 196-8 in reply to Haverfordwest’s 201-6.

Pembroke seconds lost their 11th game of the season at Crymych in division four therefore finishing bottom of the league and in a division that mirrored the first, Kilgetty seconds join them, although they had the consolation of a final day win over Narberth seconds.

Narberth hit 98 all out after Kilgetty hit 155-10.

For Narberth, Rob Webb took 6-19, while Emyr Jenkins struck 34. For Kilgetty, Andrew Evans took 3-19 after scoring 30. Richard Gwyther top scored on 37.

Hundleton avoided going down thanks to a losing draw at Hook seconds, hitting 135-6 in reply to Hook’s 194-5.

Hundleton finished on 178 points, just one point higher than Kilgetty.

Saundersfoot seconds lost to Llechryd, being dismissed for just 72, with the visitors winning by 10 wickets, while in division five, Neyland thirds lost to Carew thirds who overcame the hosts 178-9 by six wickets.

Alan Townsend hit 33 not out for Carew, Ross Grieve 33 and Simon Gronow 28 not out. Rhys Canton took 3-19.

Champions Laugharne finished on a high, beating Whitland thirds by nine wickets.

Whitland scored 101-9 and Laugharne 103-1.

Billy Kinnear scored 86 and Chris Izzard took 5-17 in Cresselly thirds’ win over Pembroke Dock who were all out for 73, while Stackpole seconds beat Haverfordwest fourths by seven wickets as they overcame the hosts 123-7.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

What the two clubs themselves had to say

Carew statement in full

‘In consequence of the coverage of this matter in some sections of the media, we, as a club, have decided not to comment further. We stand together’.

Cresselly statement in full

‘As a club we prefer not to comment at this time until the county have responded, but here is a statement by the club:

Cresselly CC would like to make a short announcement due to constant requests from various media outlets to comment.

Firstly, at no point did any of our officials or captain say that Cresselly would have done the same thing should the positions have been the other way.

We obviously feel hard done by at not being able to play a proper game to determine the winner of Division One. Having beaten Carew in the league and village cup we felt confident that we could do it. On the toss, our captain elected to field as we felt it was the best way of winning the game with such a tight margin of nine points. Thinking that Carew would want to beat us the right way and show everyone they are indeed the very best, their choice to declare and deliberately lose was at odds with their title of champions of the county.

We are disappointed for our supporters, some who travelled quite a few hours to watch what should have been a top game and also people who took time off work to play and to watch.

Many well known people from the sport have commented and it’s made a lot of online sport sites.

Some people have asked if we think ‘deliberately losing’ is match-fixing and if we wanted to go down that road - but we will leave that up to Pembroke County Cricket Club to decide.

So to sum up we are very disappointed, but we want to move on.

We’ve had a great season, with all teams having some good results. Our 2nd team winning division three, our third team doing well in division five. A rejuvenated youth section and the All Stars programme which has been a great success and ladies cricket is also on the up with the successful softball tournaments

So thanks to all involved for keeping this great club going.’