Tense scenes at the WECA on Sunday morning. Needing a win to take the league our brave ‘Bee’s’ required a solitary wicket to rollover a stubborn Old Rutlishians. Old Ruts had clawed the game back to a point where even cool Coach Cruzy was looking a bit sweaty. A mere 12 runs to win. Come on the WECA! Where’s that grasscutter when we need it most?! One more wicket, who wants it? Bailey Dean that’s who. Calmly executing Cruzy’s command to bowl straight, he delivered an immaculate linear line taking out the middle of middle. You beauty! A deserved win by 11 runs and the Tier 2 Sunday Central League title coming home!

‘Does that mean we get our names printed above the bar?’ an unnamed celebrant enquires. These boys have been fantastic this season, winning 7 of their 8 league games. They only lost to Richmond CC by the ‘barest of margins’, a mere 1 wicket. They have been astutely led by the exuberant Finn Byrne, always asking more of his troops, the chilled Carlos Cruz, keeping things nice and easy like Sunday morning and the jovial Magnus Wright, always ensuring everyone has a good day out.

And these cricketers have had plenty of good days out. If I start to mention too many names, I’ll fall into the classic trap of missing someone out and self-flagellating myself for the rest of the week. I do need to mention one or two all round performances that have seen us home though. Daniel Street, Navdeep Singh and Bastian Versace have committed to this team marvellously and held solid performances throughout the season. Daniel never saying too much, always charging in. Navdeep saying way too much but still finding time to charge in and the mercurial Bastian, performances always a little dependent on whether he’s had a sleepover the night before. A bit like me with a hangover, he seems to perform better on no sleep though?

You may be asking, so what was the key to this team winning the league? Even if you’re not asking that question, I am still going to answer it; FIELDING. I am convinced this team is the best fielding side in their league by a long shot. It all oozes from our two wicket keepers Finn Collins and Kit Hardie, very much men of action rather than words. Their magic potion then spreads like a ‘good’ covid to the rest of the team which leads to the likes of Shiveyn Malhotra, Magnus, Carlos, Danny Prichard…again I daren’t go on because I will miss someone, pulling off some superlative fielding heroics. It felt like Shiv literally flew to take a stunner v Spencer. He is very light and it was windy, so maybe he did? Is that allowed? Magnus ‘nuked’ the stumps with a direct hit v Old Ruts. I had to mention it here because he’ll never bring it up himself ?. It’s these moments of magic which have genuinely set us apart. What is really so encouraging is how as a team we really want the ball. Credit does need to go to coach Frank for instilling this confidence in the boys.

Cricket is a team game but it is largely about a one and one duel. Maybe that is why it is so compelling? Sometimes, one player absolutely smashes that duel and ends up making life one hello of lot easier for the rest of the team. In this team that player is Harry Lee. Whether with bat or ball there have been several occasions when he’s gone into ‘Stokes’ mode. Well played Hazza!

A wonderful effort from this team and there are genuinely a lot of boys I have not mentioned who have played critical roles at various parts of the season. Sincere thanks to Efren Cruz, our very own coaching, scoring and umpiring guru who creates such a Zen and fun atmosphere at these games. Additionally, I need to give special Snowball handshakes to Nigel Lee, Andrew Sheftel and Ben Dean for the various duties they have completed on behalf of the boys.
Let’s hope the boys can continue to develop their love of the game through the rest of the season. Go Bees!