COUNTRY HOUSE CRICKET

By Brian Sanderson,

The forecast for Sunday was showers but the three of us set off to Swinton Park.The three being Ron Deaton, Nigal Pullan and myself.Ron  had rung up this morning and cofirmed the match would be played.Swinton Castle is situated just outside of Masham in North Yorkshire.It is now a hotel, conference venue and cookery school and is 20 acres of parkland,lakes and gardens.The owner of the property is Mark Cunliffe-Lister who also captains the side of workers who are employed in the grounds.There opponents were Romany Cricket Club who were established in 1902 and is located in Leeds.They play friendly Sunday cricket round Yorkshire.

The Swinton side play only four fixtures a year and the last fixture was against Gentlemen of Yorkshire.The ground is situated in front of the house and has two trees inside the field of play.The local rules say that if the ball hits the tree the game continues.There is a excellent view to the hills opposite and there is not a bad view anywhere.Next to the field are deer grazing and area for polo.

The match itself was a thirty over match with everybody bowling at least two overs.Mark ,the Swinton captain, opened the batting but was soon out.During the match a catch went to fielder who could not catch it as he was on his mobile phone and the conversation went on till the end of the over.This is another first for me and compares with the wicket keeper smoked a cigarette for two overs in another match.Swinton scored in 120  all out in the last over.One of the batsman batted twice  at the end of the innings to make up the eleven.

During the tea interval we walked to the bird aviary where there was a number of owls.This made a nice change from talking in the Long Room at Headingley stadium.Also the sun was shining and there was no rain.A player from Pannal Ash said they had only played three matches this season and it is July.

Romany started will as the opening batsmen were out they slowed down.As we left for tea they were 70 for 5 in the nineteenth over so a good finish was  could come but our food won.

I would recommend anybody who likes unusual grounds to visit Swinton Park.