WHAT a great advert for cricket last Saturday’s ICC European Division 2 final between Jersey and Guernsey was.
The supporters of the two teams must have been exhausted after the advantage swung firstly in Guernsey’s favour, then Jersey’s, then very firmly in Guernsey’s before the wheels fell off and Jersey clinched, what a few minute’s earlier, had seemed a very unlikely victory. To lose after being on the verge of victory can only be described as gut wrenching.
Imagine a horse you’ve backed being 20 lengths clear coming to the last, you’re calculating how much you’ve won as the race is in the bag. It makes a mistake and its stride starts to shorten. All of a sudden a lead of 20 lengths is ten, then five and going to the line it’s neck and neck.
It suddenly dawns on you that you could get beaten and, sure enough, in the shadow of the post the other horse thrusts its neck out and wins by the narrowest of margins. For the losers it has been a roller coaster of emotions that has taken them from ecstasy to shock, despair and disbelief, made worse by the sight of the winners travelling in the opposite direction.
There’s a great picture on the ICC website (http://www.icc-europe.org) of the Jersey team showing unbridled joy, seconds after the ball was returned safely to the wicket keeper and they had clinched an unlikely victory.

On Sunday Aztec Springfield second XI secured the 1st Division title when they beat Fairbairn SCF.
A great effort as that division is becoming more and more competitive. They will see this success as evidence that the hard work they have been putting in for the last couple of years has finally paid off and, you could say borne fruits, which they certainly have more than their fair share of, like pears, James Cartmell and Alex Cooke, apples, Peter Osmont and Will Villiers, and a couple of prunes, Greg Sykes and Paul Robson. Not to mention a couple of nuts Will Gorman and Julian Burrows. Well done and hopefully some of your winning ways will rub off on the 1st team tomorrow when they take on Guernsey’s Optimists for the Sid Guy Cup.

The Islands Over 40’s are in action this Sunday against their Jersey counterparts, and they will be keen not to see a repeat of the last time the match was played in Jersey in 2006 when a Gary Rich century saw the green caps walk off with the trophy.
You can see if Jersey can repeat their win of last year at Grainville, where the game starts at 11 am.

It’s going to be difficult for tomorrow’s CI Knock out Group matches to live up to last Saturdays events, but every one of tomorrow’s four matches is intriguing, as any of the eight teams can still potentially go through to the knock out stages.
A quick recap of what has happened so far. The first matches were not played due to the weather, so all teams get average points for those matches.
In the second round St Ouen and SCF scored wins for Jersey teams against Guernsey opposition making them slight favourites to qualify for the semi’s, while Romerils and OV’s have a bit to do after  suffering defeats. This week the Guernsey teams play each other in Guernsey with Wanderers and Cobo looking likely to go through, while the four Jersey teams play each other on home soil.

Romerils v Fairbairn SCF (FB 1):
These two teams have had some real battles in the past few years and while the win balance is in Romerils favour this year, they have only just scraped through their two matches against SCF who will certainly consider themselves unlucky losers in the second of them.
It is unusual that the Island side only contained one member of the SCF team, Matty Hague, which could be a blessing as it means that the other team members will be champing at the bit after a couple of weeks off and they could find Romerils, who had three members of that squad, a bit flat after this season’s exertions.
Tony Carlyon reports a full side for this match and I think they should be able to gain some revenge on their old adversaries and consign them, once again, to the CI knock out scrap bin.
Prediction; SCF to knock Romerils flat.

St Ouen v OV’s (Les Quennevais):
If Romerils are going to be a bit flat, OV’s will be positively pancake like as they had no fewer than nine members of the fourteen strong ICC squad, and, despite having the likes of Browny around to help improve their mood, they face an uphill task this week.
Things could be a little frayed amongst some of the team members who spent the week together last week, especially those who roomed with each other.
Chris Jones’ confidence is likely to be at an all time low, despite a fine penultimate over in the final match, from which he only conceded three runs, as he was sharing with Bobby Minty who cannot have missed the opportunity to raise an eyebrow or drop the odd ‘nice pj’s Jonesy’ type of comment as poor Jonesy unpacked his suitcase.
In fact I suspect that the unzipping of the Jones suitcase will have been the highlight of his week, and caused similar levels of excitement to that of Garret O’Brien as the burger van hatch opened on inter-insular day.
Fortunately for Anthony Kay he wasn’t rooming with Bobby, as Bobby’s bad dress sensors would have been going into overdrive at the sight of Anthony’s array of underpants, especially the Christmas pudding ones. Last Saturday’s post match celebrations could have left their mark on their skipper, Pete Gough, whose 80’s style disco robot dancing has probably left him feeling a bit run down.
Anthony Kay makes a quick reappearance, after last week’s heroic efforts, for Dean Morrison’s St Ouen side who are in a good position to go through, but are unfortunately without Hugo Bishop, Mark Tribe and Rob Tewkesbury, who has broken two ribs.
This will mean the responsibility for run scoring will fall on a few shoulders but they have Simon Short and Richard Baigent and Phil Cryer to boost the side and of course Gomy who will be keen to prove to those who have doubted his abilities in the past, that his performances in the last game were not just a flash in the pan.
Prediction: Gomy form is definitely something in the pan – bed pan that is.