I sure everyone can remember the rain of early 2014 and many cricket grounds suffered as a consequence. No cricket in April but we start the Berkshire league season on the first weekend in May as planned. I stand at Peppard with Roger Seymour it the first game for the newly formed Peppard Stoke Row (PSR) team they play Woodley.
An interesting game a wicket falls on the first ball of the game then eight Woodley batsmen throw their wickets away, seven of them trying to hit sixes over the largest boundary in the Berkshire league. Waynard Lamprecht the lucky spin bowler collecting 7 for 40 in 8 overs. I would like to mention PSR Richard Ashton who took a catch and found himself stood on the boundary line and signalled six,psr went on to win the BCL fair play award.
My next 3 Berkshire league games will be with Jon Simmons, a newly qualified umpire. Sadly our first game only lasts 5 overs due to rain. No such problems for the next two games. In fact in his first full game Jon finds himself under real pressure as the game became closer and more tense the fielding team becomes more desperate and every time the ball hits the pads there is a lbw appeal, there are also appeals when the ball beats the bat. We then get to the 46th over, 2 runs needed 2 wickets in hand the over is to be bowled at Jon’s end the 2nd ball of the over is a no ball and the batsman is bowled. After a moment of disbelief from the fielding team Jon shows the bowler where his foot landed and there is no complaint. Talk about a baptism of fire.
Our second game together is again at Berk’s County Sports. This time West Reading are the visiting team. No such drama this time as West blow BCS Grosvenor away. However, we do have a tense moment when a BCS batsman takes nearly six minutes to arrive at the crease, well over the 3 minutes permitted. Imran Razzaq the West captain jokes about appealing, saying he would not want to rob a bowler of a wicket. The batsman involved only makes 5 runs as his team is bowled out for 53 in 23 overs. I really enjoy standing with Jon and I feel we have had two good games together.
Next up is the highlight of my season. I am appointed to Wokingham Women’s v Bath Women’s in the Women’s Cricket Southern League Premier Division. My colleague will be Robert Bartlett. On arrival at Wokingham Cricket Club I meet Rob and we get a cup of tea and venture out to the pitch and find the two teams warming up. Charlotte Edwards and Heather Knight will be playing for Wokingham. After examining the playing regs we meet with the two captains and toss the coin, Bath will bat. Wokingham bowl and field brilliantly and bowl out bath for 175, Wokingham chase the total down in 37 overs. I really enjoy watching Heather Knight bat, her foot work and stroke play is better than anything I have seen before. I must mention bath wicket keeper Sophie le Marchand who was brilliant, the best keeper I will see all summer and spin bowler Lizzy Westbury who took 3 wickets, including Heather Knight’s. Lizzy could have won the game for Bath had she had a pitch with a bit more pace in it. How lucky was I to umpire a game with 2 England internationals playing. I will umpire 2 more women’s game this year and enjoyed them immensely . These games seem to get a good crowd and are competitive and played in a good spirit.
Throughout the 2014 season I will be appointed to 28 games, a mixture of bcl,women’s,age groups boys and girls games. A BCL game at Sulhamstead will remain in my memory for some time. My partner was Simon Mellor from the Army, Sulhmstead won by one wicket it was a great game and Simon’s a good umpire and very quickly earns the respect of the players to a point that Sulhamstead captain Matt Gill wrote in his match report to the BCOA please send me these two umpires every week, Dennis sends us both the report saying they’re not many reports like this one so thought it right to share it with you both. Thanks Matt.
The season ends for me at Burnham for the end of season Best of District v the County side game. I stand in the under 15 fixture with Terry Spice, the Best of District side gets one over on the County side which makes Nigel Bruce a happy coach.
This year the BCOA committee has organized some guest speakers for our monthly meetings. in may we hear from Nick Cousins, July is Angus Fraser (sadly I miss this one due to work), October was the turn of the entertaining 1st class umpire Steve O’Shaughnessy followed by a very interesting talk from South West Region Chairman Les Clemenson. Les also gets the honour of handing the level 1A certificate to Jon Simmons. Well done Jon.
The end of October I attend the Berkshire Cricket League awards evening and dinner with Roy, Dennis, Jon Simmons, Colin Mercer, Martin Vlietstra, Gordon Whickman and my wife Eva. It is a really enjoyable evening the BCL has Chris Ellison as its guest speaker and Chris gives an interesting talk about his work with England Cricket Disability Team and his work now with performance cricket. After the talk the awards are handed out, the Peppard Stoke Row club has a good night picking up 4 awards most notable is the Calcot Hotel Award for fair play which is shared between the 1st and 2nd XI. Ian Hailday wins club umpire of the year and Janet Hailiday is honoured for scoring for the 1st XI since 1992. Just before this Sam Peats secretary for the BCLl calls on Dennis to award the Peter Tyler award for best panel umpire and much to my surprise and delight Dennis announces that I have won, it tops a great season for me, I am really quite pleased to win this award as I was the last man to umpire with Peter back in 2012, a true gent and sadly missed.
Season 2015 will soon be here!