Crowhurst Cricket Club

Crowhurst CC Centenary Celebrations

An aerial video of the day

Below is the Chairmans speech.

Welcome

Ladies & Gentlemen, welcome to Crowhurst Cricket Club’s Centenary Dinner and Award’s Presentation Evening. We are planning to take some photos tonight which may go on our web site, Crowhurst news etc. so to cover GDPR requirements we presume that we have your permission unless you tell us otherwise. The running order tonight will be dinner followed by the Loyal Toast, brief synopsis on the history of the club, a report from the current captain for the concluding season, followed by a talk from Oliver Smith, Sussex County’s Cricket Development Officer. We will then move on to the presentation of the trophies and finally the raffle draw. I hope you all have an enjoyable evening. I would now like to propose a toast to Crowhurst Cricket Club, and Absent Friends. Now let’s Enjoy the meal.

Toasts

Ladies and gentlemen I would like ask you to be upstanding for the Loyal Toast: ‘The Queen’.

History

I thought you may be interested to hear the following information regarding the club and its history.
When the club started 100 year ago in 1919 the club played 7 matches,
50 year later the number of matches was only up to 10, but by 1994,
75 years on, we had 2 teams and the number of matches had increased significantly to 44,
playing some of the clubs we still play today, including Catsfield, Sedlescombe, Pett, Winchelsea and Sussex Ukrainians. Unfortunately many of the other clubs have now folded. This year our fixture card had 25 games on it. We struggled at the beginning of the season but with some help from Crowhurst Park players we managed to play 19 games including the Centenary matches. As most of you know, the Centenary Day consisted of two T20 games followed by a Bar-B-Que. The teams included representatives from a number of the clubs we play regularly; making what I believe was an extremely enjoyable day for all.

Club Achievements

Over the 100 years Crowhurst have won several competitions. The 1990s proved very successful with our Junior side winning the Ward Cup in both 1994 and 1998. We won the Observer Cup in 1995 and 1996, the first time a side had retained the cup for many years. We were also runners up in this competition in 1997and 1999, and we finally had success in the Ken Turnball Trophy in 1998, an indoor competition held during the winter, having previously been runners up twice. More recently, in 2009 we were runners up again in the Observer Cup. I suspect that some of you here tonight would have played in some of these games.
Nick has painstakingly trawled through the records since 1954, coincidently the year I was born, and found that we have had: -
10 Presidents, Chaz Pearce being longest serving at 13 years,
12 Chairmen, Pete Lindfield staying for 12 years
4 Treasurers, the longest being a massif 37 years by Robert Humphreys,
9 secretaries, with Alan Collins lasting even longer at 39 years, quite an achievement, well done Alan!
And last but not least, 6 Fixture Secretaries, with me holding the record at 13 years. I’d better make a start on next year!

Some other Club records include

The Highest partnership 252* against Ore at home on the 25 Jun 1989 - Kev Barry 126* & Martin 115*
Most runs in a season Martin Barry 1,459 in 1995,
Most wickets Darren Pepper 100 in 1988,
Most catches 32 Martin Barry 1992,
Most Stumping’s Phil Benge 9 in 2019.
It must have been a good year for Stumping because I got one too! Finally the most matches played by any of our players over 100 years is our own Kevin Cornwell on 899. He now says we shouldn’t have cancelled the last game of the season despite the torrential rain, howling wind and water logged pitch. Where’s our spirit of adventure?
Thank you, I’ll now pass you over to Kevin for his report.