Welcome to the Village!
Well guys, it has been a long season and with all the rain early on in the season, I was starting to wonder if we’re gonna get any cricket played in the season. Mother Nature has been good to us with all the rain and in between all of this; we managed to play most of the games scheduled.
I have congratulated the Woman’s team for winning their league and would like to say just one more time, well done to Genny and the girls. We hope to see that the ladies get to play more games next season.
Secondly I would like to congratulate the 4th side for winning the Reserve League for the 2nd time. Well done Bernie. Hope you can keep those retired guys going for another season or two.
After a great start, the 2nd side unfortunately went on and lost 1 game more than they would have liked to and ended up in 2nd place on the log. There are a few guys in that team that has been called out of retirement by Danie for the past 2 seasons and it just goes to show that if your captain is dedicated to the game, the results would show. Well done Danie and the boys.
A special thanxs must go out to Chris de Beer our 6th side captain who took over from Andrew, who in return stood in for Vorster who was busy finishing his MBA at WITS last year.
Chris, well done on your team’s performance and on getting so close to being a real contender for the top spot in the league, ending up in 3rd place. Those last few games really hurt your campaign and the shortage of players right at the end didn’t help either.
The 1st side kicked the season off by losing 3 of their senior/key players to other clubs and Albert Beukman was thrown into the deep end and handed the captaincy. It was a rebuilding phase and with a hand full of players now having to step up to the plate and take on senior positions and responsibilities, it was always going to be an uphill battle competing against the top 4 sides in the league. Ending up in the 5th spot is a great achievement for such a young side. Greg Smith coached the side to some great victories and is really an inspiration to the team without taking anything away from Albert as captain.
I would also like to congratulate Jandre Jumat for being selected for the Northerns Amateurs side since December 2008 and he has really matured as a player in the Amateurs set up and has really carried that experience with him back into the first side in the last few games of the season. Well done Jumie and we hope to see you in the Amateurs set up more regularly next season.
Raymond, all of us in the 3rd side had high hopes for what seemed to be a great group of players at the beginning of the season, but when 2 of your key players started breaking fingers and ankles, and some of us retired, it always makes life difficult, especially in your first year as captain. I’m sure you learned a lot and applied your experience from previous years of more competitive cricket and we would like to see you carry that with you into next season. Good luck for next season.
Hilton; don’t really know what happened to you guys in the 5th side but I hope that we can re-look at that side and maybe inject a few players to boost the squad. It looks like the old ballies are struggling.
Julian, I know your team was going well at a stage but with the shortage of players and the higher sides pulling some of your guys up with very short notice, you’re always bound to lose one or two players more than expected. Better luck next season with the 7th side. I would like to see you guys competing in a higher league but the guys would have to start looking at being a bit more disciplined in trying to bat the full innings out, especially if you’re only playing 30 over cricket.
Enough said, hope you guys enjoy the winter period and we’ll see you late in August for pre-season trials and practice. Don’t eat too many take-aways and bulk up too much.
Cheers,
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