Rain

Crap day today, more or less rained the whole day, so what with yesterdays rain and now todays all the fields are going to be soaked. We've got a long weekend coming up with two bank holidays, so with all that time on our hands could this herald the emergence of the Gloucester Crew? So I'm thinking do I get the mower out some time towards the end of the week and cut the wicket on the Five Tree Field? I noticed too that even though the sky was really dark it didn't get dark till well after 6pm. If I was to cut the wicket the locals might notice that something was being done and they may all start talking about the prospect of playing there again and start turning up? The other scenario might be that they always get there before me and don't let me join in despite all the gear and looking after the wicket and cutting the grass? No matter what happens I've got to try.

It's a bit early for forecasts but this Met Office Synoptic chart shows a strong high pressure area in the south for the coming Friday. Fingers crossed and it may be the high will keep the wet weather at bay?

Other than that I'm trying to learn all the fielding positions so that when someone tells me to go and field at Fine Leg I know what they're on about! I've also been trying to learn the rules as well so that I can help out with the scoring and the umpiring. I've also been teaching Joe some of the umpires signals - he loves it and he's been watching the video recordings of last years world cup in the West Indies. Michelle in fact today said something positive with regards cricket, she suggested that Joe joins the colts at Grays and Chadwell or at least goes along to the matches with me this summer! I'm not sure he'd stick out 6 hours of cricket, so that may work against encouraging him.

I emailed Boffa last night as he'd contacted me. He reckons he can get the Tilbury boys together to form a team, I reckon that's a real possibility we could use one of the council pitches - either The Rec or the Gloucester Park pitch. I'm just wondering if any of their lot could umpire? I'll have to see what he says about my proposition.

Another thing I've got to do now if I intend to mow the wicket some time this week is mark it out. So I'll look to do that at some point. Also using the markers that I've been using they can stay there permanently and that'll be useful also for when it comes to marking out and painting the crease - that'll gaurantee that they're square and painted in consistent place.

Another thing I want to do is practice with my batting and try and persuade Thomas to bowl or through the ball in a manner that will be helpful rather than trying to throw the ball so hard that if it ever made contact with the body it would take flesh and bones with it! So I'm going to try and do some kind of exercise where I try and learn strokes and put the ball into areas I want it. Hopefully he'll be conducive with the idea?