availability Archives - Reed Cricket Club

Availabilities for the first weeks of the season

The final two indoor net sessions at Freman College Sport Hall will be held on Wednesday 5th and Wednesday 12th April between 2000hrs and 2200hrs. Your last chance to feel bat on ball before the season begins! After that, the first match of the season will be on Sunday 23rd April. It is deemed a 1st XI match away at Preston although in previous years it has been a mixture of players from all our teams. The following Saturday, 29th April, the 1st XI play their Herts County 20/20 Pool matches at Hertford. First off, Reed will play Langleybury, then Hertford will be against Letchworth. The winners of those matches then play each other to progress to the competition’s semi-finals later in the year. Also on Saturday the 29th, there will be a “Fourth XI” friendly away at Mayfield in Winchmore Hill. Sunday the 30th will see the 1st XI entertain Datchworth in the National Village Cup at Reed. On the same day, the Sunday XI will be down on the meads playing against Hare Street & Hormead in a friendly. Meanwhile, the Herts League programme begins on Saturday 6th May. All four XIs have matches scheduled and these are followed on Sunday the 7th May with another friendly at Reed versus Woodcutters. All the fixtures are listed in the Events Calendar. Please make your availability known to any of the captains or vice-captains: Club Captain: Tom Greaves - 07787 243915 1st XI Vice-Captain: Jack Tidey - 07593 611765 2nd XI Captain: Phil Frenay - 07818 566174 2nd XI Vice-Captain: Karl Ward - 07983 140002 3rd XI & Sunday Captain: Marcus Baker - 01223 207681 or 07376 186527 4th XI Captain: Lloyd Bowman - 07765 [...]

“Call of Duty! Is it waning? Is it fair to expect?”

John Heslam writes:- As we move into August another Cricket season is rapidly moving towards its close, and if we want to be frank it hasn’t been a great season at Reed! Most of our League teams currently seem to be achieving “mid-table mediocrity”, bar our hard pressed, and hard done by, 3rd XI for which that would, at this stage, be an achievement! Our midweek Cricket has been abandoned and dispensed with and now does not exist – withdrawal from a newly established midweek League without playing a single match (!), and letting down a touring side by failing to honour a booked and agreed fixture. Pretty shameful stuff! Sunday 1st XI Cricket focuses on the National Village Cup where we threw away an excellent chance of making another Lord's Final with a below par display at the last 16 stage. Add this to barely tolerated appearances (or non-appearances!) in the Herts 20/20 competition. Sunday 2nd XI Cricket is one of the few thriving and well-supported areas of our Club's current operations. This current weekend has been a nightmare for selection and availability – unfortunately not for the first time this season – and when one sees 3rd XI players volunteering to act as “fodder” to make up a Herts Championship 1st XI, and pro-rata selection quandaries littering all the other teams, then it is indeed a miracle (well done to Lloyd Bowman – AGAIN!) that we managed to actually put out a 4th XI on Saturday. Saturday's weak teams, subsequent below performances, and poor results beyond the 1st XI, might have put paid to our 2nd XI’s chances of another promotion, and might have sealed the further relegation of our 3rd XI? Time [...]