Watsonians batted first and scored 289 whilst losing only 5 wickets, the first of these not coming until the ninth over. Jamie Cousin and Rory Evans opened up steadily with a partnership of 18 followed by the pairings of James Kidd/Calum Young and Andrew Cockburn/Alasdair Middleton, each pair adding an excellent 28 runs to the total.

The final pairing of Adam Hastings and Murray Blair provided some explosive hitting, scoring 36 runs in 3 overs but lost 4 wickets on the way thus reducing their score to 16 and taking the final total to a very well compiled 289. 

If we bowled and fielded well, it was going to be very difficult for Carlton to score the runs as they were under pressure from the start to keep the scoreboard ticking over. In the first over, Adam Hastings took a wicket with the first ball of the innings and that was immediately followed by a fantastic double wicket maiden by Alasdair Middleton who was making his debut for the side. With only 2 runs coming off the third over by Jamie Cousin, Carlton were on the back foot immediately.

The next 6 overs saw some good controlled bowling with wickets falling every second over. Needing to score 49 off their last three overs was always going to be too much for Carlton and Jamie Cousin wrapped the match up with 2 more wickets in the final over with the final total reaching 264.

This was a very well organised victory for the boys who looked in control of the game from the very start. Once again, the number of wickets lost and taken was the deciding factor – Watsonians lost 5 wickets and Carlton lost 9 wickets which at minus 5 runs for each wicket equals a difference of 20 runs, very close to the winning margin.

We will find out we are playing after next week’s round of matches and look forward to another strong performance from the team.

Weston, from New Zealand, is a batsman who plays his cricket for Central Districts in New Zealand’s first class domestic competition. He is a regular feature of the CD squad alongside current and former Blackcaps Ross Taylor, Jacob Oram, Peter Ingram, Matthew Sinclair, Jamie How and Michael Mason. In addition Essex one day specialist Graeme Napier has also just enjoyed a successful stint playing alongside Tim for the CD Stags who are coached by former England star Dermot Reeve.
 
The current NZ domestic season draws to a close over the next 5 weeks with Tim in regular 4 day action for CD. The season has already seen Tim pick up some silverware though with CD sealing victory in the Twenty20 competition where they saw off an Auckland Aces side featuring Ravi Bopara in the HRV T20 Cup Final in February ensuring Central Districts qualification for the second instalment of the global Champions League tournament.
 
A Level 2 cricket coach with teaching qualifications Tim is looking forward to the challenge that a season at Myreside will bring him on and off the field. He will work closely with the age group training across our Youth Development section and whilst bringing some new ideas to training with the senior squad.

Club President Ross Brooks was delighted when announcing news of his signing “Timmy and I have been in close contact since late October and I have been extremely impressed by his enthusiasm for the game and the experience he will bring to us”. “Today’s announcement is the result of a lots of detailed discussions and the long running completion of the process we have to go to through to engage an individual in a coaching capacity”.

 
Brooks was also keen to add that he sees the signing of Weston as key ingredient for future successes of the club too, “I have no doubt Timmy will fit well into our current squad and help us achieve more positive results on the field however more importantly I believe he will help us continue to move forward as a club during his stay at Myreside, the development of our club and the development of cricket across the community is of massive importance to the clubs committee”. “Over the past 18 months we have made strategic changes in how we operate across all areas of our club and the addition of Timmy should help us deliver against our plans and the goals we have set ourselves”.
 
The Weston family are no strangers to Scotland with Tim’s brother Jonny Weston a former member of the Borders Rugby squad. Tim will be joined in Edinburgh by girlfriend Hannah who is looking forward to joining the growing band of Watsonian WAGs this summer.
 
All at Myreside extend a big welcome to Tim as he joins the ‘Sonians family

 
To view Tim’s profile on cricinfo please click here or on the Central Districts site here (and even though cricinfo says he is a keeper, he isn’t, so Stubbsy you can rest easy!)

 
Euan has in the past week confirmed that he will be back at Myreside this summer which is clearly great news for all at the club.
 
It’s been a busy time for Euan since he headed back home to avoid the Scottish white winter and he’s been juggling work with cricketing duties with an especially heavy schedule over the past few months.

 
With New Zealand hosting this years Under 19 World Cup Euan had a full schedule of games throughout the tournament whilst he has also been regularly scoring Canterbury’s first class domestic matches.
 
A man that watches this much cricket certainly knows a thing or two and Euan will be playing a more active part in helping some of the senior squad improve on areas of their game in 2010 as we look to utilise our resources to the full.
 
We all look forward to welcoming back Westy back to Myreside in April.

Everything is going well out here. Been here for four weeks now and been undergoing a pretty intensive programme of cricket and fitness work. I am also working for the HA academy as a coach which fills in the time when we are not training and also earns me a little bit of money to live off!

I am playing for Varsity CC and after two weeks in the second team I have worked my way in to the firsts where we are two wins away from winning the league, hopefully a sign of things to come in the season back home! We won last week against a team called Zingari and I had figures of 7 overs for 14. Yesterday we beat Ladysmith by 100 runs with our captain, a Zimbabwean international, scoring 183*. I bowled 10 overs 1 for 18 so was very happy with my work.

The weather has been very very hot, although yesterday was a little bit breezy which was a bit of a relief during my 8 over opening spell! The standard of cricket over here is mixed, the side I am playing for are strong with anything up to 7 Zwazulu Natal Inland players and two Zimbabwean Internationals in the side at any one time! Last week those 9 were added to by myself and a South African u19 player who is with the Dolphins academy so I was in pretty good company!

Away from the cricket field I have been trying to see as much of the country as possible, volunteering to go on the long drives for coaching in places such as Kokstad (which is half way on the garden route to Port Elizabeth) and Winterton which is two and a half hours in the other direction! Next week we are spending three days on a game reserve in northern Natal which should be a great experience and we have also had a couple of trips to Durban, going to a waterpark and also the Sharks v the Chiefs in the Super 14! I must admit being more of a football fan I was more excited by the world cup stadium beside the Absa stadium, which was huge, brand new and will host a semi final! The whole country is football mad at the moment with the world cup coming up, and it is a great place to be!

Hope everything is going well in preparation for the new season, I am very much looking forward to getting back and getting going! After a week at home and then two weeks in India with the other Scottish boys. Good luck to the team in the sixes semis and final on Friday, hopefully the club can get the first of a few bits of silverware for 2010!

Cheers for now, Paddy

The club wishes to congratulate Stuart Nimmo, Luke Gray, Phillip Bryans and Matthew Little who were all selected for trials at the Pentland U15s squad at Loretto on Sunday .

The players have all been working hard at their games during winter training with the WCC Under 15 squad and each of them have earned the opportunity to showcase their talents at a higher level.

WCC Under 15 Head Coach Mike Cash was delighted when announcing the news last week “This is a great opportunity for the guys to get some decent coaching and play cricket with and against good players”. 

Cash was also quick to add one piece of advice  ”I am always keen to instil one clear message to all our young cricketers, the more hard work they put into it the more they will get out of it ”. It’s a message that all the Under 15 squad have taken on board and one that is clearly helping all of them as they seek to improve all aspects of their game during the winter months.

Congratulations once again to Stuart, Luke, Phillip and Matt and we look forward to following your progress through the ranks at ‘Sonians  ]]> http://www.watsoniancricket.co.uk/general/15s-squad-receive-pentland-trials-call-ups/feed/ 0 http://www.watsoniancricket.co.uk/general/support-sonians-at-finals-night/ http://www.watsoniancricket.co.uk/general/support-sonians-at-finals-night/#comments Fri, 26 Feb 2010 13:09:34 +0000 WebAdmin http://www.watsoniancricket.co.uk/?p=431 This coming Friday (5th March) sees ‘Sonians in action in the finals night of the Cricket Media Indoor Sixes Tournament at Mary Erskines.

The Myreside Men under the captaincy of Ross Paxton qualified for the semi final stage by beating Heriots twice and over coming an East Academy side once and will now face a side from financial services firm Martin Currie who feature Fraser Watts, Gregor Maiden and Stuart Davidson in their line up. Martin Currie (who formerly competed as ‘Bank of Scotland’) are the current holders and also came through their group by winning their first 3 games before losing a dead rubber to SNCL side Uddingston.

The Watsonian CC v Martin Currie Semi Final kicks off at 6.30pm on Friday 5th March and it would be good if there were a few familiar faces to cheer on the team and they attempt to reach the final scheduled to be hosted at 8.30pm that evening against either Carlton who won group D or the winners of the Group D in Freuchie or an Edinburgh Uni side featuring our own George Cairns.

Ross Paxton has named his side for the evening which sees a club debut for new boy Stuart Chalmers.

The WCC side is as follows;

Ross Paxton (c)

Euan Stubbs (wk)

Stuart Chalmers

Mike Leggett

Ali Fleming

Garrick Sutherland

Ross and his team look forward to seeing as many of you there as can make it.

An overview of the tournament can be found here

Batting first the men from Myreside amassed a huge total, passing 170, for the loss of only one wicket – captain Ross Paxton for a 5 ball 15. The early momentum was continued by clever cricket and powerful hitting seeing Euan Stubbs, Ali Fleming, Ben Fox and Garrick Sutherland all swiftly retired and Mike Legget not out in the 20s.

An entertaining batting performance was backed up by a mature and disciplined bowling effort restricting Heriots to a score in the 90s. The quicks looked threatening up front and tight spells from Fleming and Paxton put the result beyond doubt. Only veteran batsman Tino Weeraratna offered any resistance.

Having qualified for the semi-finals, Watsonians faced a dead rubber against a strong East under 18s side who made up of 50% ‘Watsonian’ had already brushed aside Heriots. Bowling first Watsonians restricted the East youngsters to 109 despite strong showings from Peter Legget and Andrew Chalmers who will hopefully be regulars for the club in the summer months. Going out to bat, some poor shot selection, worse running and a couple of slices of bad luck conspired to see ‘Sonians skittled for 31, Watsonian youngster Paddy Baker starring for the East with the ball.

Despite a poor showing in their final group match, Watsonians have put in some strong performances in the last month and will be measuring their success in the tournament only by toppling Martin Currie in the semis, victory in the final and lifting the trophy.

 
Finals night is the 5th of March and it would mean a lot to those taking part if as many of you as possible can make it down to MES and support the club

The sessions are designed with specific aims to improve speed between wickets, reduce run outs suffered whilst preparing fielders in the outfield in a bid to save runs, reach catches, and gain that extra yard.

“These sessions have been designed to give the team that extra physical edge so that our cricketers can perform to their greatest potential” says session organiser and Level 2 UKSCA Strength & Conditioning Coach Mike Leggett.

“The sessions are broken up into two sections, Speed & Agility and Speed Endurance. Everything is cricket specific and involves catching, fielding, and running in full batting gear”

The Speed & Agility section sees players working on a variety of drills that improve the players speed and acceleration over 5-20 metres, their reaction speed over 0-5 metres and a players change of direction speed. This involves technique work, speed & agility drills, running at 100% max effort for short distances. It involves sprinting over various distances starting from different positions such as a fielding stance, the batting lunge, and dive positions. These include the changing of direction at speed to simulate running half way down the wicket only to be refused by your batting partner and having to change direction as fast as possible.

The Speed Endurance section includes shuttle runs of various distances such as 4 sets of 4×22 yard shuttles with a rest ratio of 1:1 or 1:2 all done at 100% maximum effort, this is then repeated after 2 mins rest. A variation on this can involve completing the shuttle work in full batting gear to simulate a cricket game.

“Cricket is an extremely explosive sport” confirms Leggett “As cricket mainly involves running short distances but at maximum effort it is therefore is very important to simulate this, the sessions are designed to give the squad an extra sharpness to enable us to hit the ground running at the start of the season”

As a Level 2 UKSCA Strength & Conditioning coach along with being an effective left arm seamer, Leggett who plays for Watsonian CC is currently studying Sport & Exercise Science and works part-time as Strength & Conditioning Coach for the Scottish Rugby Union where he works with age group players, he is also involved in the East of Scotland Institute of Sport where he works with all sorts of different athletes of various ages.

The sessions are held on Wednesdays, 8pm to 9pm in the small hall at Mary Erskines. For more information contact Club Captain Steve Paige

A full report of the evenings events will appear on the site soon

WCC batted first and made 112 runs (net +12).  It was an innings of two halves, with the first half adding a strong 41 runs (46 runs, 1 wicket) and the second half losing 29 against some very accurate Carlton bowling (31 runs, 12 wickets most of which were bowled).  That’s where the game was lost – in its innings, Carlton lost only 4 wickets in its innings of 154, only one of which was bowled.  It was a different story in the field, the WCC team looked pretty sharp and quick and the bowling was generally tight (we bowled 11 wides to Carlton 9).  The takeaway is clear – our batters need to hit the straight ball every time. 

But there were some really good WCC performances nonetheless.  Tom Counsell, Matthew Brian (a great debut for this P5 youngster), Calum McDonald (another fine debut) and Patrick Brown added 41 at the front of the innings, and Calum Martin and Jamie Boyd each hit a crashing 6 later on.  Matthew Oliver and Patrick Brown took a wicket a piece and there were 2 fine run outs.  Calum Martin took a sharp catch.  And Matthew Bedford (despite feeling very ill) and Tom Counsell each bowled 2 tight overs, Matthew conceding 9 runs and Tom only 5. 

Plenty to build on!