Walkden looks ahead to the start of the season…

With the start of the season, and in particular Cricket Week fast approaching, we caught up with Elected First Eleven Captain Ben Walkden and he shared his thoughts about the upcoming week.

with no college cricket for over eighteen months, bar a couple of fixtures back in September last year - we will face a tough test next week against some high quality opposition.

Leeds Beckett University and University of Liverpool particularly, regularly feature at the top of of the BUCS Championships, competing at the highest level in ‘North A’

Manchester Metropolitan University will provide strong opposition and although we have never played them before, competed last time out in ‘North 2A’ - so will provide a great fixture for us, no doubt.

It will be great to reinvigorate an old rivalry, on the Thursday, against Myerscough College Preston - a fixture which has seen some great games throughout recent years and should be a good curtain raiser for our Two day fixture later on in the Summer, which is something starting this year and which we hope will continue in the future.

First of all, I can’t wait to get going next week. It will be great to get back on the cricket field again after a long time away with some new faces around the camp. I feel excited to lead the boys out next week and hopefully start the summer in a strong manner.

Next week will be tough for all of us, we have some great fixtures and we look forward to having some great battles with. We have pre seasoned as a squad well enough to get positive results next week.

With the team at my disposal, we have many strengths across the board that can cause damage to the opposition. We will make sure we are up for the challenge come the 12th.

Next week will be great to get back into the swing of things, but the season is glorious to look forward to. We have plenty of fixtures across the summer we are definitely not short of cricket, and with the players we have to choose from we will hopefully be very strong.

Squads for these games will be published over the next few days, and details of fixtures can be found on Play Cricket - we will be hoping to live score the games each day.

We will be kicking off the season against Leeds Beckett on Monday 12th April - at Ashton on mersey, starting at 11.30am and will be 45 overs per side.

All of our fixtures will be played in accordance with government guidance and following all of our COVID protocols.