Royal Cricket

Tuesday, 15 February 2011

WORLD CUP - FANTASY CRICKET

Join in all the thrills and spills of the 2011 CRICKET WORLD CUP by entering the WICK fantasy cricket league... It is FREE to enter!!

Simply visit; http://espncricinfo.fantasyleague.com/Index.aspx

Enter your details and join our very own WICK super league.

League Name: WICK WORLD CUP

League Pin: 10214

4 Free Corona's for the Winner!!

WICK

Wednesday, 26 January 2011

WINTER NETS - ESHER

Esher College Nets

Net organiser;

David Fudge

Training Dates;

Sun 6th Feb - 10:30 - 12:00

Sun 13th Feb - 10:30 - 12:00

Sun 20th Feb - 10:30 - 12:00

Sun 6th Mar - 10:30 - 12:00

Sun 13th Mar - 10:30 - 12:00

Sun 20th Mar - 10:30 - 12:00

Sun 27th Mar - 10:30 - 12:00

Sun 3rd Apr - 10:30 - 12:00

Address;

Esher College Weston Green Road Thames Ditton Surrey KT7 0JB

http://www.esher.ac.uk/information/Pages/location.aspx

Please see www.hwrcc.co.uk & http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.hwrcc.blogspot.com%2F&h=10826 for more information.

WICK

Wednesday, 29 December 2010

Team of the Series - to Date

Always a good one this. From those currently fit to play (removing any debate about Broady or Harris).

Openers... Cook. Strauss (a moment's hesitation over Watson - he's got more runs than Strauss...) No, Strauss. Gets it for solidity and proven ability to convert a score.

At three... Trotty. No issue. The new David Boon. Limited but effective. If he gets in, will get you big runs. Ponting not fit to clean his boots in this series. At four... KP. Still the best bat in the England set up although weight of runs has not been quite there has looked very clam and authoratative. Knocks Clarke into a cocked hat. At five... Mr Cricket. You can't have Colly in the side on the form he's showing. Six. Bell vs Watson... and Watson loses out again. Just. Seven. Haddin. Better series than Prior although it's close. Haddin has come up with something almost every time he's batted. Prior's one knock of substance was flaky stuff. Haddin's keeping a micron better than Prior who has looked a little suspect standing up to Swann at times. Eight. Swanny. Only spinner in the series worthy of the term. Eleven. James Anderson. Brilliant this series in almost every innings.

So... two more bowlers. Siddle first. Should have been better backed up in Brisbane and bowled with real skill in Melbourne. Tries his bollocks off. Then... Tremlett. Has bowled beautifully in his two games and convinced any doubters. Sould have been better supported by all his colleagues in Perth otherwise might have seen a different result there.

No place for Bresnan. Bowled superbly in Melbourne but hasn't done enough to get the nod at this point.

Cook. Strauss. Trott. KP. Mr Cricket. Bell. Haddin. Swann. Siddle. Tremlett. Anderson. The funny thing is... it really doesn't look any better than the England XIs we have put out with the exception of Mr Cricket for Colly...

Hang on a Minute...

As much as Wickman has enjoyed watching us browbeat and demoralise this Aussie XI and "retain the Ashes for the first time in 24 years" the job isn't finished. Not by a long stretch.

Any England cricket fan worth his or her salt will want to see us press for a series win in Sydney, no less. There will be a real sense of deflation in the Wickman camp if we come away from this at 2-2. While we will still have the urn, Aussie sides of the past 20 years made sure they won the thing outright and didn't retain it on a technicality.

This England side earned the right to come into this series with the advantage of having the Urn, compelling Australia to beat us to get it back. But who seriously thinks its enough to come away with a series draw and say "Well, we played them in their back yard and kept it - that's good enough for me?"

There was a sense last night in the early hours as the old guard who knew the feeling (Gower, Botham) and Hussain (who never did) failing to spot that the job isn't finished yet. Declaring England to be the better side and burnishing the pedestal was a failure to understand the real hurt of the last 20 years. That has been that we have been comprehensively dismantled in most of the intervening series. They have been pretty one sided and in most of them we have failed to take a lead at any point in them barring the miracle of Edgbaston when Nasser got a big score and the last two home series where we have largely come from behind to turn things around.

This is a good achievement no doubt. We've secured the Ashes until 2013 and no one can take them away. But the bragging rights will be much diminished if we don't put another convincing performance together with bat and ball in Sydney and at least shade the game.

There are five more days left in this series. The clamour for Australia to start rebuilding and pick the successes from this team (Hussey, Haddin, Siddle, Watson [ish]) and pick seven amoebas to prepare them for the next Australian Reich is somewhat premature.

Ponting MUST captain the side in Sydney. He has one last shot at redemption and must be offered the chance to take it. The only established batsman who could take the honour is Clarke and if anything he is in worse nick than Punter. Mr Cricket does not have captaincy credentials. Too quiet. Too nice. Haddin for some reason is never mentioned. Watson is a grade A nobber and never looks interested unless someone is giving him sh*t in the middle. There isn't anyone else in the Melbourne XI who is guaranteed a trot out in Sydney.

And Punter must bat at three. He might not be making runs right now but is Khawaja or Ferguson the answer in a crunch match with England on fire with the ball? Neither have done much to recommend them while England have been touring. Why set them up to fail now? Those guys need to come in at five and six and be given an opportunity to suss the game out. Hussey needs to come in at four but hopefully when the ball isn't new. Haddin has been batting a position too deep.

The selectors ought to dispense with Hughes right now and let him get some runs against a side that don't know how to bowl at him. And they should jettison Clarke as well for a Test. Let him get some runs in Shield stuff and prepare for the one dayers. Bring back Katich. Wickman hates watching him but he's a better bet than Hughes. Persist with Watson in the Hayden role. And blood one of the newbies. So: Katich, Watson, Punter, Hussey (step up man!), Khawaja / Fergusson, Haddin as a top six which should be able to make 350.

Then remodel the bowling attack. Now Wickman's knowledge of fringe members of the Aussie squad is not what it should be but let's face it with Harris on the gurney for two months it's time for some desperate action. Whatever reason that Hauritz has been left out needs to be addressed and he needs to play ahead of the spinner no one wants to play... Beer. Siddle is inked in. A real tryer with some passion. Wickman likes the cut of his gib. Johnson. Johnson. He needs someone to give him a rollicking and to stop fannying around.

There was a moment in Trotty's innings where he was scratching out his mark again. Johnson decided to come round the wicket. And there he was, captured on camera, re-gripping the ball like Sergio Garcia with the yips, and running through a little warm up "jump, rotate arm, let go of ball while rolling fingers down the seam" routine. He's been over coached, over tolerated. FFS! Get him in a room with Brett Lee and Merv Hughes after a few beers and get them to tell him how to let it rip again. He was the best cricketer in the World 18 months ago.

Hmm. So that's Hauritz, Siddle and Johnson. Is Bollinger fit? Don't rate him actually. Where's Tait? Yes. Bring back Tait. Get him to bowl at 97 mph for a bit. One match. NO pressure. Just knock some heads together. And then pick Smith. For the future. And find one other bowler from Shield cricket. Perhaps that chap who got some England wickets earlier in the tour. Katich. Watson. Punter. Hussey. Khawaja / Fergusson. Johnson. Smith. Hauritz. Siddle. Tait. A N Other.

It's not a world beater but it gives Australia a chance of getting something from the wreckage.

Monday, 20 December 2010

WIckman's View from Behind His Fingers

So erm... there it was. The comprehensive Ashes winning performance that everyone expected from this England team. Not.

Wickman mentioned that this Australian side hadn't just become Bangladesh overnight and that there was no guarantee that we would win on a result wicket. But my oh my how we capitulated. In just about total control at 0-78 after getting Australia for a manageable 268 you would have thought that our much vaunted top six could have rattled up 400 and put the boot on the Aussie neck.

But Johnson suddenly found his range and Harris delivered and once again we'd thrown away a dominant position against the old enemy like we managed to in Headingly 2009. Immediately the English media have turned on the team - almost in some form of payback for the guys letting them down after they had written so much guff about how we were going to wipe the floor and keep the Urn in time for Christmas.

The title of this piece would suggest that Wickman actually watched some of this test. Well. He didn't. The lure of a lie-in on the Saturday and Sunday mornings (with no golf to drag him from his sack) was too much to resist. When he turned on the radio for an update it was clear that torturing himself by trying to get up and wrest the remote from Spongebob watching little Wickmen was going to be too much of a battle - especially if it was going to be to see various England tyros ducking bullets from Johnson and wetly steering Harris to the slip cordon.

That it was topped up by the thought of watching Watson finally get past 60 and us bowling full tosses at the middle of Hussey's bat was too much to bear. So rather like the England team after the second day, Wickman chalked this one up to the cricket Gods and set his alarm clock for Melbourne.

The MCG Test now takes on massive significance. There is already talk that the Aussies are preparing another result wicket (although one that won't take any turn). We are back to West coast time so it will be possible (if not desirable) to watch the first sessions rather than the evening ones which really didn't go England's way in Perth. And we are now back in a series - a good old fashioned dog fight the like of which we haven't seen in Australia for years. Two tests to go and the Ashes could reside with either country. But you get the feeling that both sides are pretty fragile right now. If one gets on top in Melbourne then the series is heading in that direction.

Right now it's too close to call. England have had one hand on the trophy and you wonder if at 78-0 they actually were imagining they had two on it. England took 20 wickets for the second successive test. We just failed to tough it out with the bat. That's three times we've capitulated in this series against two decent efforts. It's time the batsmen came back to the party and this time bought some booze and a couple of racy birds too.

Tuesday, 14 December 2010

Perth Hoodoo... Will it Help?

What with the all the triumphalism about in the English media and the downright suicidal tone in the Australian media, you would be forgiven for thinking that England will destroy Australia for a decade this Thursday.

During an Ashes series abroad it's traditional for the Aussie media to be raising Shane Warne onto a pedestal. But things have got so grim for them that this time around it's because he's shtupping a middle aged lady with great cans who has appeared in some adverts, a dress held together with safety pins and was cast aside in favour of a skanky prostitute by floppy haired fop Hugh Grant. If you were English you might be asking why he has to fly round the world to score these days. But then that's probably because he already has every woman's telephone number in Australia on his mobile.

And actually things are pretty grim for Australia. So bad so that Greg Chappell has tried to post-rationalise dropping Johnson as a "rotation policy". They've picked someone called "Beer" to give the sub-editors on Aussie newspapers something else to pun with rather than simply variations on "Selectors are idiots, team is a disgrace". And one paper has called for the resignation of chief selector Andrew Hilditch. But only after the World Cup. Crikey. The press must be hoping he stuffs that up too so they can carry on writing this stuff until well into April.

So the question is... how bad actually IS it in the Aussie camp? Are they feeling the pressure? Well... there are very few of them claiming they are going to win the Ashes now. In fact all talk of targetting batsmen is out of the window. The press are hoping that Jimmy A has screwed himself by flying back to the UK. (Interestingly he claims to have stayed on Aussie time for his visit - very easy with the UK dark for 24 hours a day at the moment). They also seem to be hinting that the England players will be so exhausted from catching up with 44 days of no conjugals that they will be unable to stand on Thursday never mind bat, bowl or field. And there is some crowing about Cooky not batting for three consecutive millennia on a pudding in Melbourne.

This is STILL not a terrible cricket side even if the preparation and background work from the selectors and media people has been poor. Ponting, Clarke and Hussey are still good bats. Watson is a good number six who just happens to be opening. Haddin is as good as any keeper batsman, Gilchrist aside, that Australia have produced including Healey. There are runs in them there hills... even if the openers look a bit iffy.

The bowling does look a bit popgun at the moment but Perth is just the place (if the curator is to be believed) for a fast / seam attack to prosper. Especially if it's green to start with. That will be a good toss to lose. And England have already fallen over once in the series and haven't dominated in any of the State games in the way that did on the flat Test tracks we've all become used to.

You sense that the Aussies are desperate to have a result wicket here. They cannot afford to lose, but a draw simply puts more pressure on them to win two on the bounce on tracks that are not expected to be wicket fests. There is some debate as to what a four day wicket in Australia is like but that's what the curator has prepared he claims and monkeys to the hierarachy at the WACA who would prefer the game to go the distance.

So this has all the hallmarks of a shootout, here and now, for the urn. Win this and the Aussies only need to win one more game. Lose it and they have to win two to even draw the series, Ashes gone. The only fly in this particular ointment is that actually England have been better in seaming / quick conditions than Australia recently. Game well and truly on.

Thursday, 9 December 2010

HWRCC 2011 COMMITTEE & CLUB CAPTAINS

Captain of the Club and Chairman of Committee:

KEITH NICHOLLS

Hon. Secretary:

NICK CLARK

Hon. Fixture Secretary:

JOEY BREAKWELL

Hon. Treasurer:

KEITH NICHOLLS

Hon. Fundraiser:

MATTHEW DAVIES

Hon Colts Leader:

CHARLIE BROWNING

Welfare Officers :

M FLETCHER, JOE EWEN

CAPTAINS

1st XI Saturday:

MATTHEW DAVIES

2nd XI Saturday:

DAVID FUDGE

3rd XI Saturday:

NATHAN SINGH

Sunday XI:

GRAEME TONG

Wednesday XI:

ROBERT SISSEN

Twenty20 XI:

MARK MACKIE

Club Scorer:

ALSION WHITCHER

League Represntative:

TOM CROWTHER

Elected Committee Members

GREG UNSWORTH

STEPHEN RILEY

PHILIP LINTER

MATTHEW GOULBORN

Kit Manager:

RICHARD COLE

WICK

Wednesday, 8 December 2010

2010 CHAIRMANS AWARD WINNER - NICK CLARK

The Chairman's Award is special!! By all means fill your boots with 500 runs or take 50 wickets, we won't mind that!! But what really makes a club tick, is it's members and one's devotion to the cause, devotion to the WICK!!

Lots of people up and down the country play cricket. But there are a few special people at every club that put in hideous amounts of effort to ensure that majority are able to just turn up and doe exactly that; play. It's the behind the scenes stuff that really makes a cricket club what it is and the WICK such a special place to be a member of.

We are fortunate to have a number of these special people at our club and they have once again given up their time to help improve the WICK in 2010.

So rightly so the following people received nominations for the 2010 Chairman's Award; Dominic Lown, David Fudge, Greg Unsowrth and Charlie Browning all made a real difference this year and their hard work will never go un-recognised, however this years recipient really stood out from the crowd.

Nick Clark was announced the winner of the Chairman's Award for 2010 and received his trophy to rapturous applause on Sat night.

Nick's persistent effort to move the club forward was rewarded with the WICK being awarded Club Mark in the Spring of 2010. This was a great achievement by Nick and the rest of the sub committee and provided a real feather in the clubs cap. Clarky wasn't done there. He excelled in his new role as Chief Selector, helping the league captains continuously get strong teams out on a Saturday and actually represented the WICK in League, Sunday and Wednesday cricket to show their is life in the old dog yet. Add this to being Hon. Club Sec and head of club communications (Who is WICKMAN?), Nick was also pivotal in helping persuade GRCP to become new Sponsors of the HWRCC Colts.

All that's left to say is, Thank You Nick, and you are totally and utterly WICK!!

WICK