The Most Village Moments From The 2020 Cricket Season

Although this season has been shorter than usual, the amount of village moments caught on camera has been far from lacking. From questionable keeping kit to ropey bowling, missed run outs and dropped catches, we’ve seen it all this summer.

We get sent great videos every day, so we've decided to compile the best in blog form. Please enjoy these ‘highlights’ of the 2020 village cricket season...

Dodgy Umpiring Decisions

We’ve all been there. The captain looks around his team as they wait to bat, they either get padded up or try not to catch his eye as he scouts his team for an umpire for ten overs or so. All of a sudden, having already told him you don’t know how to score, you get given the thankless task of calling the shots in the middle. Decisiveness is key, as this unfortunate umpire found out:

Horror Fielding Displays

What is a game of village cricket without its dropped sitters and awful fielding attempts? When you’ve got the batting side on the ropes you have to push home the advantage: bring in a second slip, get your fielders in on the one and have your quickest thinking player standing in as a close catcher. Unfortunately, this man managed to blag his way into silly mid-wicket:

Arriving In Your Whites

There are several unwritten rules of village cricket: the wicket-keeper must wear long sleeves, let the opposition have tea first, making sure you say ‘we don’t mind seeing that’ when a batsman advances down the wicket and hits your slow bowler back over his head for six... to name a few. But one of the most important unwritten rules is to never turn up to the ground in your whites unless, you’re 12 years old. This year however, without the use of changing rooms, this cricket basic was challenged.

Disgruntled Groundsmen

They’re the lifeblood of the club. Without them, the matches just wouldn’t happen. This season has been particularly tough on council owned grounds where no pre-season preparation was carried out at all and a massive thanks has to go out to all the groundsmen and women who helped get the pitches ready for a huge amount of cricket in a short space of time! Such was the rush to get grounds ready on time that sometimes corners were cut...

Tailenders

In professional cricket, when your Number 11 goes in to bat, you know they have an outside chance of squeezing perhaps 10 or 15 bonus runs out of the opposition or holding up an end for your Number 4 to reach his hundred. Village cricket is quite different. When your final batsman walks begrudgingly to the middle , you can only hope he remembers which way up to hold the bat... exhibit A:

Field Of Play

We are blessed with thousands of cricket grounds in the UK, with almost every village you drive through home to a team or two. Which means that sometimes cow corner, is literally just that...

The Excitement Of A First Wicket

The run up, the action, the braces, the celebration. If you haven’t seen this clip it really is a marvel. George McMenemy took his first ever wicket and epic celebrations ensued! After we shared his clip on That's so Village and it clocked up nearly 1 million views, George was featured in an article in The Cricket Paper. Here's to many more wickets next summer George!

Run Out Mix Ups

Yes...wait... no! The calls that leave the non-striker with their hearts in their mouths. On this occasion the senior pro was on the receiving end of this call from the junior at the other end. A slippy wicket never helps in these situations...

Village Cricket In A Nutshell

Sometimes a video comes along that perfectly encapsulates the absurdity of village cricket. This is one of those clips:

Village Cricket Hero Of The Year

When this photo first surfaced on Twitter, Heathrow CC's wicket-keeper received relentless chat for his keeping attire... or lack of. Black trainers, short sleeves, batting pads and batting gloves!? That's so village.

However, the full story revealed something much more heroic. What a legend!

Short Sleeved GoPro B*stard

Finally, my own village moment of the summer, in our first Cricket District XI match . Not much to be said on this one other than my favourite comment on Twitter... ‘Go-Pro Short Sleeved Bastard !!!’.