The most successful part of the side were the batsmen. The success gained was mainly due to our first 4 batsmen, Whiting, Manion, Rigali and Campbell, all of whom scored over 200 runs. The most successful batsman was M Whiting, who almost beat the school record of runs in a season, by scoring 676 runs in 18 completed innings and averaging 375.
The biggest weakness in the side was the bowling, and the fact that we could not bowl sides out meant that we drew far too many games, many of which we should have won. J Gibbons was the star bowler, taking 36 wickets for 412 runs at an average of 11.5. The rest of the bowling was shared by Cregan, Manion, Whiting, Hegarty and Clements.
Our fielding was sometimes excellent, but more often very mediocre. M Campbell kept up a very high standard behind the stumps, collecting 23 victims in all, (9 ct, 14 st). W Carey took several excellent catches in the deep, and finished with a total of 11, while A Rigali picked up some very sharp catches close to the bat, finishing with 10 catches in all.
The highlights of the season were M Whiting's "ton", against Enfield, J Gibbon's 8 wickets for 24 runs against St Edwards, and W Carey's 4 catches in the match against Finchley.
Our season was climaxed by a very disappointing tour to Yorkshire. Having only lost 2 games out of 15 before we went on tour, we were confident of doing well. Unfortunately our batting, bowling, and fielding all let us down, and we lost the first three games and managed to draw the fourth.
It is encouraging to see the growing interest in cricket all through the school. This interest demonstrated by the fact that we managed to run a school 2nd XI for the first time in a number of years, thanks mainly to Mr Clark.
Our thanks to Mr Tufnell, who umpired most of our games and who also arranged our tour. Thanks also to Mr Grogan who accompanied us on tour, and to everyone who helped out with teas, umpiring and scoring.
T Hegarty
1ST XI RESULTS
Played 22, Won 7, Drawn 9, Lost 6
Ron Feeney taking most wickets: 40
Angelo Rigali scoring 420 runs average 19.4
Angelo Rigali and Mark Campbell played regularly for the county XI.