A different experience

posted by John Winn

'Eclectic: selecting or choosing from various sources' and an ideal word to describe the conversation among pcws at Arthington yesterday where in sunshine even better than Saturday's a crowd of over fifty saw the game between Arthington and Doghouse CC from the Middlesbrough area. The visitors were accompanied by a number of female spectators, presumably the keepers of the keys to the doghouse. Otherwise it was the great and good of West Yorkshire with representation from Leeds, Bradford, Huddersfield, Pudsey and all stations west plus the odd intruder from North Yorkshire, the border of which is just a couple of miles from the ground.

Such was the press for seats that as the afternoon wore on chairs were brought from car boots to provide extra seating and topics under discussion included Shostakovitch's Seventh (too many notes the majority view), the cost of taking a dog on a day's outing from Penzance to The Isles of Scilly (£25 would you believe), Leeds Rhinos' success the evening before,  the Papua New Guinea chess team and from time to time matters of a cricketing interest.

In the match itself Doghouse batted first and rattled up just short of two hundred by tea. Supplying so many with refreshments taxed even the indefatigable Liz and when play resumed Arthington lost early wickets, not helped by a run out which left the victim understandably rueful and eventually they were dismissed a little short of three figures*.The last pair were back in the kennel not long  after half past five, by which time the temperature was such as to remind us that it is a week into October and even on a day like yesterday the cold soon gets into mature bones.

There  is one more weekend for such a congregation to meet again and enjoy cricket this season. Next Saturday's visitors to Arthington are Cambridge Road Methodists and on Sunday ground sharers Hawksworth will bring the festival to an end. Wouldn't it be wonderful to think that the sun would shine again like it did yesterday and that there could be another such good turn out of pcws? For as Peter France, whose first visit it was yesterday, so splendidly described the afternoon 'it is a different experience', indeed it is.

* Apologies to those looking for more details of the scores but what with trying to keep people up to date with the T20 Final in Colombo and at the same time keep it from Brian Senior I failed to take much notice of events on the field.