Whitchurch Cricket Club Tour

Les Ormes, Brittany, July 2007

The touring party started assembling on Friday night (in time for the pizza takeaway-only outside in the rain event) and all were present by the time we were two wickets down on Saturday afternoon.

Last to arrive were Cormac, Duncan, Tania and Catherine, who had travelled in style down from Paris in Cormac's Renault Kangoo.

Pictured are the pride of Whitchurch CC pose in front of the Chateau des Ormes. From left to right: Lyn Williams, Jim Power, Harry Williams, Chris Russell, Geraint Jones, Mike Butt, Ronnie Khan, Scooby Williams, Cormac Neeson, Chris Grogan, Robbie Cotgreave, Steve Willis, Duncan Seward.

Saturday

Whitchurch made a slow start, during which skipper Grogan must have wondered about the wisdom of his unorthodox "this'll fool 'em" opening partnership selection.

After the first 10 overs, we accelerated the scoring thanks largely to Chris Russell's 100*, G's 40 and Duncan's 33*. Duncan rode his luck when he was dropped 3 times off the same ball, helping us to finish on 233 for 4 in our 40 overs.

After a delightful tea, we took the field in glorious sunshine. Thanks to some aggressive opening bowling, Les Ormes made a slow start, but accelerated alarmingly with an innings built around Mike Scanlon's 114. Once he was gone, we managed to slow the scoring rate and take wickets. Les Ormes finished on 214 for 6, giving Whitchurch victory by 19 runs. Duncs had the best bowling figures with 3 for 20.

Saturday Evening Training

A quick beer or two, a shower, and it was time to return for the barbecue.

Some comedy fielding during the day kept the fine-master (see his report below) busy distributing "wine" at the barbecue, where Scooby ate his own weight in Merguez sausages. Having emptied the coolboxes, we moved on to a bout of over-refreshment at the bar.

Due to the outrageous number of catches dropped during the day, the Whitchurch Fitness and Conditioning Coach, pictured demonstrating a balancing drill, insisted on extra training on Saturday evening.

First up was a Neeson-organised Kronenbourg and Pastis marathon. Sadly, that was as far as the training session got, leading to the cancellation of the Midnight Andrew Flintoff Pedalo Challenge and a poor turnout for the school disco, probably to the relief of the other patrons.

Sunday

As expected, a slightly dishevelled Whitchurch dragged themselves up for breakfast, golf, and even the cricket.

Despite quite heavy rain, the artificial pitch meant that the game started, despite the ball causing small waves as it bounced on the pitch.

Slow scoring, a steady fall of wickets and long interruptions for the really-heavy rain made for slow progress. Skipper Lyn urged us all to "Think blue thoughts!" before reconsidering to "No! I mean think blue sky thoughts!" but that didn't work. As the picture shows, Ronnie resorted to batting in his waterproofs, though it didn't help much.

At about 19 overs (ie after about 3 hours), the game was reduced to 30 a side and Whitchurch pressed on to the disappointing total of 96 all out.

With a low total to defend and improving conditions for the Les Ormes batsmen, we knew we were up against it. We bowled well but without taking wickets and Les Ormes pressed on. Ronnie made a breakthrough with the ball after swapping keeping duties with Grogie, but Les Ormes made the runs with 8 wickets and overs to spare.

Fine-Master's Report

The Tour proved yet again a very productive event for the finemaster. Not least for himself for turning up late for the game and then going to the wrong pub afterwards. Very expensive!

Other than that there appeared to be a bad outbreak of The Dropsey on the Saturday in particular. For this the finemaster had initially prescribed a course of leeches, but in the absence of any the offenders had to make do with drinking fines. There was a very poor display of tour bandanas from last year which proved very expensive for the offenders and hopefully this shameful situation won't happen again as fines will be carried over to following years.

Finally two tourists, who shall remain un-named, were fined for having sex before tour. And if we could be sure of the prospective fathers they would have been fined as well.

Finally the finemaster (and the opposition!) noted the poor state of drinking on tour generally this year, with only 3 people making it to the Disco de Teenagers.

News

Winning Start
Whitchurch started the season with a good bowling and fielding performance to beat Pangbourne by 3 wickets in this 12-a-side 30 over game. Pangbourne batted first and made 94 all out. Williams H, Batchelor and Cole bowled great spells. After a shaky start Whitchurch's reply recovered to win with 3 wickets to spare at 95-8.

Family Fun 10th May
Kids Kwik Cricket Tournament, BBQ, Family Day and Car Boot Sale on Saturday 10th May 2008.

The Kwik Cricket is open to kids of 7 and up in teams of 8. To join in, download the form (Microsoft Word) and email to back to us.

2008 Fixtures
The 2008 fixture list is finalised and is here. Fixture cards are being printed.