It’s been a busy week preparing for the return of cricket. Not only that, but our new 2-lane outdoor net facility is complete!

The net facility is a fantastic addition to Menston Cricket Club and will mean that fewer practice sessions will be affected by wet weather. It’s a big step forward as the Club aims to cater for an ever growing junior section and more player numbers generally.

A big thank you to everyone that has been involved in the project, from design and planning to legal and funding, not forgetting the logistics of access to the ground for the contractors – it’s taken nearly 5 years and over £40,000 to get it in place from the initial ideas. We hope you like the result.

We expect that the facility will be very popular over the summer – outside of normal weekly training sessions you can book it for £10 an hour, so if there are 5 of you sharing a net session, that’s £2 a head. Bookings will be via TeamApp – more details to follow over the weekend. In the meantime, if you want to make a booking for a particular day / time, please contact menstoncc@btinternet.com to ascertain availability.

So, alongside this great news, the other exciting news is that cricket matches can now be played – there are some intra-club matches on Saturday and Sunday. League fixtures start next week.

There are lots of rules regarding match play and if you are playing this weekend, your team coach / captain should have already informed you of requirements, which include:

- maintaining social distancing at all times
- wiping the match ball every 20 minutes
- throwing the ball straight to the bowler (not round the field)
- no use of changing rooms (bring a beach towel or windbreak if you feel you might need some privacy when changing into batting gear for example), so arrive ready to play
- bring your own food and take litter home with you
- bring your own hand sanitiser
- designated areas on the boundary edge for each team and a separate area for spectators

There’s lots more – please read the various documents, alongside the Club’s own Risk Assessment, which is available in the ‘Documents’ section of TeamApp. Any questions can be directed to your team coach / captain, or send an email to menstoncc@btinternet.com

And if that isn’t enough, grab yourself a copy of Duncan Hamilton’s latest book “One Long and Beautiful Summer” – Menston Cricket Club’s 1st XI captain, Adam Montague-Millar leads the way in a win against Calverley and is mentioned alongside the likes of Ben Stokes and Jofra Archer in a chapter that contrasts local and Test cricket.