2014 Diary

A Ramble on Women's Cricket
 - with diversions -

This diary will be updated erratically throughout the year.

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While Martin Davies has set up an unusual set of Awards on his blog I thought I would take a similarly left-handed look (sorry all you lefties out there) at what has caught my eye during 2014. Now I should stress immediately that I am being highly selective here in what I list below and many fine performances go unremarked. Some of this list will be highly predictable, but I have included a few that  either had me saying to myself "wow" at the time or which I look back on with pleasure, not having realised beforehand what was in store.

Into that latter category comes a couple of innings by one of the finest left hand bats I have seen in an overseas side for many a year. Smriti Mandhana must have taken many English supporters by surprise. Her obvious mastery with the bat and the purity of her play was quite remarkable and for those like me who particularly admire those with a "text book" technique it was a real pleasure to watch her. It would seem, from the expression on her face in almost all the pictures I captured of her this summer, she thoroughly enjoys her batting too.

On the domestic front, Charlotte Edwards' commanding innings against Sussex at Arundel must rate as one of the more remarkable of the summer.

Charlotte celebrates her 150

Another batting performance that will remain firmly in my mind is the century that Danni Wyatt made also against Sussex - no prizes for anyone who doesn't know me where I spend my time during the County season. This was in some respects not the kind of innings I have seen from her before. So often she is thought of as a T20 player and it's an opinion with which I'd disagree. While it's true she has the 'no-fear' attitude that suits the shortest form of the game and is someone I would never omit from any T20 side, I feel her 50-over talent is underrated. This season she is third in the list of run scorers in the 50-over county championship and, being among the finest fielders in the country, earns her side quite a few runs in every game regardless of the score shown against her name on the scoresheet.

Danni Wyatt on her way to a century against Sussex in the County Championship

One thing I am often 'accused' of, as a photographer, is failing to record a catch. Well there are catches and catches. Recording those that fly into the air and take an age to come down are not too difficult but make surprisingly boring pictures unless they follow a route somewhat like the superb example Charlotte Edwards took in Trinidad around a year ago. This was an over the shoulder catch requiring fast feet and superb judgement without the advantage of being able to watch the flight of the ball until the very last moment.

However one sticks firmly in my mind in the domestic season this year and it occurred in the dying moments of the season. These are almost impossible to record and for once I wasn't ribbed about it. Sarah Taylor, fielding in the covers, caught a tracer bullet, literally after it had just passed her right shoulder. Now we all know Sarah's remarkable ability to catch almost anything behind the wicket, and she has been marked down for the 'Catch of the Year' in this blog before, but even Sarah looked surprised at this one. Her remark, something on the lines of "it had gone past me", being stated in an unbelieving tone, tells you how remarkable it was. Furthermore, I will brook none of the "either it sticks or it doesn't" remarks about these catches. If you don't practice and don't have the talent, you can be sure it won't 'stick'.

The Awards Night at the Sussex County passed off brilliantly as always. If Charlotte Burton has a talent in addition to all the coaching and management work she does for the Sussex Women's Cricket Association, it's her ability to organise an event like this. Thanks must go to all the other helpers, including Alexia Walker, Marisa Green and 'Charlie' Russell to name but a few.

As it happened that day was Georgia Adam's 21st birthday and the Sussex U-15 team decided to make a special presentation to Georgia who had coached them during the season. The speech by Becky Landy was one of the highlights of the evening for me. Sending up in superlative style the typical sycophantic tributes you see at the Oscars and elsewhere was hugely amusing. That young lady has a future in comedy if she cares to take it! Sussex have Awards for best this and that in batting, bowling etc. but if we decide to have one for a humorous speech I am not sure anyone else need compete.

If I had a prize for the coolest heads I guess it would have to go to the two Indian batsmen who saw out the play on day four of the solitary Test match. In a game when wickets seemed to fall at an incongruous rate, Mithali Raj and Shikha Pandey kept their heads and batted sensibly to reach the winning total. For those who made it to the fourth day it must have seemed ridiculously simple, but in view of what had gone before it could easily have gone horribly wrong!

Shikha Pandey (above) and Mithali Raj batting on the final day of the alt="[Shikha Pandey © Don Miles]" one-off Test at Wormsley

If you had been present at the first of the matches against South Africa at Chelmsford you might have felt that the series would become a one-way street. However, South Africa improved with every match and it was obvious from the increasingly small margins by which England won, that confidence was building  in the visitor's camp. By the time the final game was played it had become a close run thing.

One other newcomer to the scene, at least with the adornment of some hefty camera kit, is Laura Malkin. Do check her out on FLICKR. I especially like the imaginative use of monochrome on the linked page.  How's this for an example of "less is more"?

Picture © and courtesy Laura Malkin

You'll be seeing a lot more of her work in coming seasons and it would be an insult to hand her the 'best newcomer' award as her work indicates she is already a seasoned photographer at a number of sports!

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