A big thank you to Tom Andy Pop, Chris A for organising fixtures and sorting out player availability – without that, be difficult to have any fixtures.

A big thank you to all who made themselves available to play, and indeed did play – every 1 of you made a difference

We need a major recruitment drive to get new players in … there must be a wealth of undiscovered talent within the BBC.

Worked with a selection committee of Chris Ancil and Harry Low, and I thank them for their input, which was any time from a Wednesday evening through to Saturday afternoons.

At the start of the season, I was working to selection guidelines, which were soon abandoned – with a focus instead moving to getting eleven players out each week. The younger players from previous seasons were rarely available, and they were missed!

The main selection issue this season was being able to turn out with 11 players available and on occasions having to play with fewer players, and needing to borrow opposition volunteers. The captain’s challenge was getting the right balance between wanting to win and making sure everyone who did turn out got a meaningful involvement. I did not always get that balance right.

I appreciated the commitment made by players to turn up and play in the fixtures, and that meant being forgiving of ‘Bushmen’ like efforts in the field and being very aware that their presence made the fixtures possible.

From the start of the season, I made a point of ensuring that I lost every toss we had, some would call that unfortunate.

Willing tourists needed – we had our 2 UK tours cancelled this year due to lack of available players tourists. What do we need to do to revive the touring spirit?

Dorset and Suffolk have both been very enjoyable events in the past.

Des Ormes was a truly enjoyable weekend tour. Pizza, overnight rain, late nights, the oldest recorded Bushmen opening bowling attack, the return of the youngster, some victories on tour!

Outstanding Performances of the season

I will leave it to the committee to decide which award goes to Harry Low who topped the batting with over 1,000 runs, topped the bowling wicket takers, and the fielding wicket taking.

Congratulations!!

Summary of the season

Turning to the season, we had 25 fixtures arranged for the season from April – September. We won 9, drew 1, lost 12, had 1 game abandoned due to rain and 2 cancelled.

• V&A – beautiful setting magnificent tea, and came second by some distance.
• Fernhurst – Harry top scored with 80 runs in a relatively close game.
• Middleton Stoney – comprehensively beaten, highest score in our innings was 25
• Great Canfield – first victory of the season. Rain shortened game caused us to turn to a Bushmen version of the Duckworth Lewis rule to give us a thrilling game. Devam Shah and Eharrad Ashraf top scored with 30 runs each.
• The Ivy CC – remarkably a drawn game with level scores
• Farningham – a comfortable win with Kishan Chaglani making 101 and retired not out.
• Epping – Harry Low and Naman Paropkari steered us to a comfortable victory. Wickets shared out with 3 each for Devam Shah, Naman Paropkari and Michael Cockerell.
• Outwood – saw us take the field with rain preventing us from completing the fixture.
• Frieth – a win which saw Kishan score another 101 and retire not out.
• Kirdford – lost despite a 115 runs from Harry Low and 94 from Tim Lambert
• Farningham (again) – and lost again despite Harry Low’s attempt to win the game single handed with a season’s best 140!
• Stowe Templars – Devam Shah’s 63 and Lachlan Nieboer’s 3 wickets couldn’t save us from defeat.
• Groombridge – won comfortably with Harry Low taking 4 wickets, Michael Cockerell 3. Harry Low made 97 runs (after being told he was ‘close’ to a ton and Oscar Floyd made 90!
• Farningham part 3 – lost again
• Chrishall – won a close game with Naman Paropkari taking 4 wickets and Harry Low 3
• Steep – a victory for Steep – Lachlan Nieboer top scored with 115 not out, and Harry Low took 3 wickets.
• Newdigate – we fell just short chasing 301 runs to win, we got to within 10 runs. Oscar Floyd cut loose and made 114 not out … one more over would have given us an unlikely win!
• Pinkneys Green beat us comfortably, with Harry Low and Lachlan Nieboer taking 3 wickets each.
• Northwood Town – won by 58 runs with Naman Paropkari taking 3 wickets
• Hartney Witney – final UK game of the season in another beautiful setting saw the Bushmen win by 8 wickets. Harry Low and Naman Paropkari saw us home with 87 and 84 runs respectively. We were short and borrowed a very impressive 15 year old lady fast bowler from the opposition.

Des Ormes – saw the return of some of our younger players, and the oldest Bushmen opening bowling attack on record with combined age exceeding 160. Luke Hastings had ‘99’ problems but the pitch aint one.

We played two games of 20 overs – won 1 and lost 1, and a 40 over game which we won. The Sunday victory was assisted by the opposition’s late night (I understand they left the bar at 4.30am) which caused their best batsmen to remain on the sidelines.

Summary of performances

The most appearances for the season were by Harry Low (22 appearances) and Michael Cockerell (20 appearances)

Outstanding performances with the bat –high scores

• Devam Shah 63 – once in, batted in a hurry
• Anthony Fincham 67 – a hard working and well constructed innings!
• Naman Paropkari 84 – always a classy batsman
• Tim Lambert 94 – Cruelly distracted by being told he was ‘getting close’!
• Luke Hastings 99 – On tour ..”99 problems but the pitch ain’t one!”
• Kishan Changlani 101 – made this score twice retiring not out on both occasions
• Oscar Floyd 114 – This was scored very quickly and nearly gave us an unlikely victory chasing 300+ runs
• Lachlan Nieboer 114 – a ‘secret weapon’ who won us the game
• Harry Low 140 – what a magnificent season with over 1,000 runs, would you believe that even with this top score we did not win the game?

Bowling

My “go to” bowlers for the season were Howard Owens, Devam Shah and Naman Paropkari (first change) – tight bowling which usually restricted the opposition’s batsmen to slow starts.

Harry Low – first change top bowling wicket taker with 23, and honourable mention to Michael Cockerell with 10 wickets

Most overs

Harry Low 86, Naman Paropkari 81, Michael Cockerell 73 (and he tells me he should be bowling more)

Fielding  – top fielding wicket taker – Harry Low

The Bushmen…nec tamen consumebatur

Statistics 2022

Played: 23; Won: 9 (41%); Drawn: 1 (5%); Lost: 12 (55%); No result: 1

Gerry Tucker – Captain