Cricket in Spain

Not the usual type of post today but just to let everyone know that a new activity starts up in Valencia today. After a few weeks of evening practice under the Alameda bridge in Valencia, cricket comes to Valencia at the baseball pitch in the riverbed from around 2.30pm onwards. A touring team comprised mostly of Aussies and New Zealanders but based in London is in Valencia for a game of cricket against the Levante Select XI. Our first game. We may have to ask them to go easy on us. So anyway the post is about cricket in Spain so if you are interested in playing cricket in Spain you may want to keep an eye on the post as hopefully there will be some responses from other teams around Spain and there may be one near you. So far after announcing the initiative on Twitter and Facebook we have found that there is a team in Ibiza, one in Altea, another in Torrevieja, one in La Manga, there at least used to be one in Javea and most importantly for us there is already one in Valencia, the Valencia Greens made up of the local Pakistani lads who have a Facebook page too. Obviously we are going to arrange a few games against all of these teams but if you know of a team somewhere who play regularly and are looking for a game then get in touch. We may be able to help put you together with some other teams in your local area. So how have we done it? Well, one of our players had a huge amount of equipment sitting in his parents' house in the UK doing nothing. Sports Direct now ships internationally and their equipment is so cheap!! Balls for 2 quid! Using a Facebook page to get things organised has worked out well as virtually everyone is on Facebook now. How will we do? Not sure but I can assure you of one thing, our fielding will be the worst ever seen as that has not really been practiced ;-). Running between the wickets may be a bit hit and miss too. And what about a scoreboard I hear you ask! Well there is an app for that. iPad scoring app allows a full system and even wagon wheels of scoring (If we actually score many!) I think cricket can work really well in Spain as long as the grass pitch issue can be sorted. There is sun and lots of it, time is not of the essence and now with so much unemployment there are loads of people with lots of time on their hands. They could actually have a ten day test match here ;-). However the best comment about cricket from a Spanish person came from Rafael Benitez when asked about it while managing Liverpool. Watch the video from the 35 second point. That is why foreign countries that don't play the game don't generally get cricket and honestly you can see why.