Merger talks between the Central Yorkshire League and the Leeds-West Riding League have been halted.

In a statement at the Central Yorkshire League's annual meeting at Ossett Cricket Club, league chairman Chris Madden said: "Last month members of your management committee held informal discussions with officials of the Leeds-West Riding League to explore the possibility of re-organising our two leagues to our mutual benefit.

"Following these discussions, it was agreed to refer the matter to our full management committees to decide to continue these discussions on a formal basis with a view to presenting detailed proposals to our respective clubs, who would then decide to approve or reject the proposals."

The statement continued: "This matter was debated at length at our management meeting on December 6.

"Following this debate, it was felt that there was an insufficient level of support within our management committee to continue our discussions further.

"The Leeds-West Riding League have been informed of our decision."

Elaborating on the statement, Madden said: "At the moment, we have 27 clubs and cricket clubs are not springing up out of the ground, and therefore you either lose clubs or gain clubs from other leagues."

Mindful of the fact that the Central Yorkshire League have lost ten clubs in 11 years and only gained three, Mad-den added: "We don't want to be in a situation where we lose three or four clubs.

"We want to take steps to safeguard the integrity of our competition.

"Our Premier (division) clubs would not have been affected by this merger but lower down the league we have one or two weaker clubs who it might have provided a little bit more competition for.

"Who knows whether the Leeds-West Riding League clubs would not have become a force? Our leading three Premier clubs have all joined the league within the past 20 years.

"But the stumbling block was the standard of some of the sides in the Leeds-West Riding League and the standard of some of their grounds.

"And there wasn't a sufficient weight of feeling (only 40 per cent) behind us to go ahead with more merger talks."