This was a much wetter summer than 2022, and it's really a surprise that we managed to get seven games played -- even if some were shortened affairs. The new fixture at Ladock was the only one to be completely written off, and by the end of the tour it had become a bit sunnier and a lot drier.
A late start and a shortened game at Bugle featured a debut fifty for Harry and some debut wickets and several raffle prizes for Tom J-C. We won fairly comfortably in the end. Another late start at Pencarrow and another fifty for Harry: he and Pete were building a good partnership when we had to reture them both. Even some late beligerence from Mark Hailwood wasn't enough to save us. The threatened deluge at Boconnoc held off an hour or two longer than feared, and we had time for a 30-over game. Half centuries for Jason Doney (Dhoni?) and Ian Hunter took the home team to a competitive-looking 165, but another 50+ score from Harry (a large amount of it while he was trying to get himself out) and some late thrashing from Matt Borley saw us home with overs and wickets to spare.
A 20-over evening game on a wet Saint Neot pitch and with a short boundary on one side was an intriguing affair. There were two retirement 30s on each side, but the two for the home side (Pete Tancock and Spencer Ham) were the more powerful ones. If they had been allowed to go on, they would quickly have overhauled our score. A full afternoon at Saint Stephen saw more retirement fifties and a decent score of 212 for the home team to chase. In the end, their best batsmen found a series of bizarre ways to get out and they didn't get very close.
At Teign Valley, we put the Erratics in and watched them compile 229 on a track that had seemed to be hard going for batting. Chris Cook, who just missed out on a century, and Anuj were the stars with the bat. In reply, we looked to be down and out until Sam started hitting boundaries for fun. His 137 was the second highest ever score for us. Nobody else got past 19. Wickets for Anuj and Cook bowled us out nine short. Another Cook century (this time from Matt) took us to 253 at Killerton. There were also runs for Fraser and debutant Oompah Loompah, Dom Shaw. Broadclyst, with Andrew Daldorph to the fore were going well, but lost their three key wickets in five overs and we ran out fairly comfortable winners.
Chris Cook was player of the tour after some fine performances and some great general contributions to life on the tour. Ani and Laura Trook were joint supporters of the tour.