SENIOR REVIEW 2025 - 1ST XI

On the surface, the 2025 season wasn't kind to the 1st XI. The season started in farce, with half the squad succumbing to injury and illness following a "fitness day" in Yorkshire. It ended in disappointment with relegation from Division 2 and an abandoned game with fellow bottom four side Deane and Derby. However, from an observer's viewpoint there was much to enjoy about the 1st XI campaign, despite the overall struggle.

While it would be easy to point to the loss of players as a huge part of the poor results, 2025 also provided an opportunity for younger players to step up and test themselves at a much higher level than they may have anticipated when April rolled around. With Lachie unable to bowl due to injury and Ryan laid low following the unfortunate outing across the Pennines, the bowling attack looked pretty stretched. Matt Smalley was expected to spearhead the pace attack, but he also was unable to play as regularly as hoped. This essentially led to a knock on effect with bowlers earmarked for the 2nd opening spots to step up. Jack Schofield and Faisal would have expected to bear the brunt of the bowling in the 2nds, but played much of the season for the 1sts, leading the bowling attack alongside Lenny. New overseas recruit Vish was earmarked to fill the spinners berth alongside Callum. Young Luke Hall was also drafted in for many games, again offering him good opportunity but perhaps losing vital overs for the 2nds.

Ironically, it could be argued that it was the batting that was lacking in the early season. Phil Hayes was of course a notable exception, having perhaps the best start to a season in TSJ living memory. He scored two centuries, a 90 odd and another half century in the first four games, but it was not enough to gain maximum points. Ironically, his first "failure" (only 40!) came in game 5 when the side chased down more than 300 to record their first victory! Others began to put in some performances, but middle order collapses continued to plague the side. Indeed it was late August before anyone outside of the pro and two overseas players notched a half century, with Callum's 50 not out against Woodley a rare batting success to go with his consistent bowling efforts.

Injury had also cost us the services of last year's regular wicketkeeper and team cheerleader Danny Ashburner. In his absence, keeping duties were shared between Mooro, a rejuvenated Clive Brooks (enjoying his best season as a batsman for the 2nds in decades and also putting in really good efforts stood up to the wicket) and Phil Hayes. While all performed admirably, the atmosphere on the pitch seemed much more muted compared to previous seasons - Lenny of course the obvious and notable exception!

With a gap starting to widen between the bottom four and the safe ground further up the table, the cricket committee was given permission to bring back former pro Mike Burns in the hope of a positive run to secure safety. Burnsy delivered with the ball immediately, taking five wickets in a victory against Denton West but unfortunately back to back defeats coupled with some freakish results for Deane and Derby meant that the uphill battle was just too much to overcome.

While much of this sounds negative, let's look at what was positive. The emergence of younger players and valuable time in the middle will certainly benefit the likes of Oscar, Lucas and Luke in the coming seasons. All have benefited hugely from exposure to much stronger opposition than they'd face in the other senior sides. It's also worth noting that despite the failure to convert several winning positions into results, there have been some huge scores racked up; several games saw in excess of 600 runs scored, much credit for which goes to the superb wickets prepared by Kieran and co, and the sizeable close season spend on new drainage. The dry weather did of course help but the new drains completely transformed a boggy field into one where every game until the final weekend was completed, and where pretty much any shot beating the in-field was running away to the boundary.

Lachie also produced a number of superb innings, especially towards the end of the season - his enthusiasm and attitude around the club was noted on several occasions by non-playing members and he'll be an excellent leader in the field in 2026. With both Phil and Burnsy also committing themselves to the club for the coming season, we would hope for a much stronger performance next year and hopefully a return back to Division 2 at the first opportunity. A final word on Phil's batting - a return of 930 runs at 49 in a difficult season is to be applauded, however much I'm sure he'd trade some of those runs for the team's survival. We also wish Nathan Hall well as he disappears Down Under for some valuable cricketing experience - hopefully he'll get lots out of it and return a better player as Ryan did some years back.

I'd personally like to thank every player for their efforts - a difficult season is never easy to endure but we'll all come back stronger next year.