Due to appalling turn out, we were forced to abandon the event. Thanks to the few who did turn up.

If you want the club to spend money on developing the clubhouse, buying new nets, paying for coaches/players, flattening the outfield, paying for a groundsman etc etc. you had better support club events as money, you may be surprised to know, doesn't grow on any of the trees down at the ground!

A much narrower margin of victory for the old boys this week. They took it 3-2 which was decided in a very close final set. The standard was very good this week with all four of us playing fairly well (perhaps Ern may have been an exception to this).

Whilst waiting for Baz to arrive from work Brindy and Ern took Jock on on his own. When Baz finally arrived Jock was trouncing the pair of them 16-7.

ABCC are holding a race night on Saturday night at the Oddfellows Arms in the back room. Everyone is welcome to come along to support the event. I don't know exactly how many confirmed guests we have so far but i know that the majority of people that i have spoken to are going.

Entry costs just £2.50 with each bet costing 50p. There will also be the option of a curry that will be provided by the pub itself if anyone requires food. I don't know how much that will cost. We are hoping to start at 8pm, so again, we ask you to turn up on time otherwise you may miss a race or two. There will be 8 races and an auction race.

Last years event was really good but was held on a sunday night so turn out wasn't spectacular. Being on a Saturday this year there are no excuses for poor turn out, so we expect to see you there.

Badminton returned this Friday. A misunderstanding meant that Baz wasn't in attendance on Friday. In his place, Badger partnered Jock. Ern and Brindy were overawed by the sheer class of the new pairing. The first 3 sets were all won by the new pair with only one of them being contested closely. The fourth set saw the old boys register with the scorers. They took the set fairly comfortably in fact. Then it was back to normal and Jock and Boycs took the final two sets to claim a 5-1 victory.

Baz should be back this week to take his place along side Jock.

ABCC have been beaten in their first game of the season. We played an indoor friendly against a Simon Price Select VI. The Bank were beaten by about 70 or 80 runs. Click Here for a report.
Badger has also done a report, click here for that.

After spending a whopping £8.99 for the glorious darts trophy for last fridays tournament, the damn thing has been broken. Champion Dave Dixon was enjoying some sort of kebab and dropped it onto the pavement, breaking it into two pieces. I'm sure that when it comes to next years event the trophy will be mended and as good as new.

Astwood Bank Cricket Club will be fielding a 6-a-side indoor team to play against Harvington at the indoor cricket centre in evesham on easter monday. I'm not sure who is in the full team but i know that it is being captained by Baz and that Boycs, Pedley and Myself are playing. I'm not sure who else is playing. I don't know what time it starts either but 2 o'clock rings a bell for some reason.

Sorry, but not much really happening at the moment. There is a playing and ground committee meeting this thursday evening at the Oddies. Thats about it though.

Following sarcastic comments from Mr Daws Junior about the level of news reporting on the site. Perhaps he should note that it is not always easy to find newsworthy things to write about involving a village cricket club.

This weeks badminton saw the introduction of Boycs and Freeman to the badminton circuit. The format changed to encorporate the new pair. We started off by having a round robin where each team played each other at doubles, while the team who weren't playing could play singles until it was their turn to play again. Then we played a couple of games of singles each.

In the first doubles game, new boys boycs and freeman took on Baz and Jock. As usual Baz and Jock took a total pasting. Then Boycs and Freeman took on the oldies Ern and Brindy. This was a close game that eventually finished up 25-23 to the oldies. Baz and Jock then took on their regular opponents and after a good start were looking good but once again they crumbled and were beaten.

It was then time for the singles, which really separates the men from the boys. And after months of complete toss being spouted from Big Ern and Brindy about how good they are it was time to show them who was boss. Ern took on Baz and hammered him easily, while Boycs took on Pest but noone cares what the score was. Jock took on Brindy and gave him a good thrashing. Brindy then went to play Baz and gave Baz a good hiding, while Big Ern came over to play Jock. Jock again dished out another tonking, beating Ern by a good 10 points or so.

I must admit, i was expecting to beat the pair of them but i was hoping that the games might have been a little more competitive.

Jock (who has been suffering from horrendous back trouble!!) has been beaten for the first time in the ABCC Darts Championship. Dave Dixon from the Bell became the new Champion by beating Jock 3-0 in a one sided final. The tournament saw 25 entrants battle it out to become the champ. The main surprise of the night was bottom seed Miles Haslam who beat Statto, Dan Sealey and Spud before being beaten in the Semi Final by Jock. Brindy came close to making the final but was narrowly beaten by Dave 2-1 in the semi.

I'll put a full report with photo's/video's etc on the darts page either later today or tomorrow as i have to go to work now.

The club has purchased a new peice of equipment called the Katchet. This is used for close catching practice. Should be useful for some of our less prolific catchers of the ball (Smelly, Stef etc.)

As you are all aware from over the winter we have been working to secure a player / coach level 3 for the 2008 season. The outcome from players meeting, which was approved by the Full Committee, was to secure a British coach, ideally a level 3 playing coach, alternatively a level 3 coach, recognising it would be extremely difficult to find such a qualified British person. I can confirm that we have secured Richard Hadley, a Level 3 Coach, for training nights only throughout the 2008 season. We had another candidate, who was a playing coach level 3, but after several weeks of meetings and regular communication he was unable to join us this year due to work commitments and will not be playing or coaching this year. This does not mean this option is completely closed we will keep in touch with him over the next year as he has not ruled out coaching and playing for us in the 2009 season.

As we have secured a coach only for 2008 this means we will not be having a paid player for the club in the 2008 season. The reason for this is the remit from the players meeting, and voted for by the members, was a player coach only over the next three years, so we are not actively looking for a paid player. We will continue to look for a playing coach for the 2009 season as again the remit was a minimum three year plan.

We have made the decision to secure Richard now as he already has alternative options and we did not want to lose the only option we currently have. As only the Junior Chairman came forward from within the club with a name for a coach we feel it is too much of a risk to hold out any longer.

If anyone has anything they wish to discuss about this issue please feel free to contact Dan Evans or Mark Brind

The playing committee are in discussions with a level 3 coach about becoming our senior coach for the 2008 season. This would involve 2 hours of coaching on a Tuesday night throughout the 20 weeks of the season. I'm aware that negotiations are pretty much complete but dont know if i can officially say anymore about it so i wont for now. I'll speak to the playing committee and let you know when i know for definate.

Anyway, the arrival of a new coach should see training become far more structured and far more beneficial to the players at the club. Lets just hope that more people can be bothered to turn up to practice this year as last years turn out at practice sessions was quite frankly abysmal.

After the players meeting held at the end of the 2007 season it was decided that the club should invest in an external coach, in order to improve the players that we have at our disposal. It was planned that the person who we invested in would also be able to play for the club. But after negotiations with the planned candidate broke down late last month, the search was broadened to include coaches who don't play.

Turn out for last nights net practice at Evesham was below par. If you can make it to training then please turn up as it is not cheap to hire the sports centre for 2 hours.

I now have access to a better digital camera, so i am able to record video's that are of a decent length and quality. Cooky has shown an interest in recording some interviews and stuff, so there may be something worth watching on there at some point. I'm going to have the video camera down at darts night as well.

I have posted some info HERE about the darts tournament next Friday.

Yet another pasting for the youngsters. This is becoming quite hard to take. The oldies took it 4-1 again. I spent my Sunday afternoon this week at the NIA watching the All England Badminton Championship Finals and tried my best to find a new partner for this Friday but with no success, i'm going to have to stick with Baz.

This week i think we are going to change the format to a Davis Cup style, where we will play as teams still but will play 3 doubles matches, then play 2 singles matches. I will without a doubt play terribly because i will be trying to replicate all the fancy shots that the Chinese were playing on Sunday!

Happy Birthday to Tom Harris who is now 18 years old.

Due to the fact that nothing much has really happened over the last week or so since the skittles night here is a summary of what i can think of that may be worth knowing:

• I have been working on the play-cricket site so that it is up to date for the start of the 2008 season. We have to do this because results are being recorded this way next season. It is a pretty good site and will be pretty useful when records are kept up to date. I will put links to the ABCC play-cricket site on our website when i can be bothered.

• It is rumoured that Clarkey may not be playing cricket this season due to his new found love. Good news for Boycs, i'm sure, as this may spare him the axe for another season!

• ABCC Darts Championship is next Friday (14/3/08).

• The fundraising committee met at the clubhouse on Saturday afternoon to discuss changes to the clubhouse. We have highlighted several areas for improvement, which should make a significant change to the way the bar runs. Big Brother and any other TV programmes that appeal to total morons have been banned from the TV for 2008. There will, hopefully, be a dart board in place throughout the season, however, this shouldn't be used if the clubhouse is busy after matches. We are looking into improving the quality of the beer. Also, we will be removing quite a few of the completely pointless things that live on the walls of the clubhouse. (tie rack, photo's of hats, etc.).
  

Last night was the first ABCC Skittles Night (first for a while anyway). The event was held at the White Lion in Astwood Bank. I'm not sure exactly how many people attended last night but there must have been around 80 people, which is a really good turn out. Thanks to everyone who came along to take part.

The skittles were carried out using the 'killer' format where everyone has 3 lives and take it in turns to throw. After what seemed like about a month, the 80 odd entrants were whittled down to the last few. The last two ladies left in the competition were Sue Brind and Ros Daws. They played out to be crowned ladies champion, and after two or three goes each Ros claimed the victory. It took a few more turns for the gents before we were down to the last 3. The Fox, Harry Prew and Josh Hoult contested to become mens champion. Josh and Fox both missed their goes, which left the Prew, who had been deadly all night, a chance for glory. He hit and was crowned mens champ.

Due to the fact that we had a spare trophy, we decided to have a grand final between the mens and ladies champions. After a miss each it was mens champion Harry Prew who was crowned grand champion of skittles 2008.

All in all, everyone seemed to have a good time and it was good to see a wide range of clubmembers and their families and friends at the event.

I will be posting photo's from the event at some stage but the camera isn't working at the moment.

Next Event: ABCC Darts Championship 2008, Fri 14th March.