West of Scotland Cricket Club
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| West of Scotland | |||
| Coach: |  Isaac Umeed |
||
|---|---|---|---|
| Captain: |  Ian Young |
||
| Founded: | 1862 | ||
| Home Ground: | Hamilton Crescent | ||
| Capacity: | 4.000 | ||
| in 1891 | |||
| at Hamilton Cresent | |||
| SNCL Champions wins: | 1 | ||
| SNCL Premier League Champions wins: | 1 | ||
| Scottish Cup Winners wins: | 2 | ||
| Western Union League Champions wins: | 10 | ||
| Official Website: | [1] | ||
The West of Scotland Cricket Club is a large cricket club based in Glasgow, Scotland. Their ground is Hamilton Crescent located in the Partick area of Glasgow's West End. The current Chairman of the cricket club is the long-serving John Thomson.
West of Scotland, traditionally, are one of the working class cricket clubs in Glasgow and on a summer's day there can be quite a jovial, rowdy, yet well informed support on the famous banking. At the moment West boasts of the ultra talented, powerful opener Douglas Lockhart. Lockhart is a member of the Scotland side as well as being a former Oxford UCCE player and having had trials with Derbyshire.
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[edit] History
West of Scotland Cricket Club was founded in 1862 as a result of a meeting which took place at the then Clarence Hotel in George Square, Glasgow, between a group of local businessmen and players from the Clutha Cricket Club, who had used the northern part of Hamilton Crescent for matches prior to West's inception.
One of the businessmen present was Colonel David Carrick Buchanan who became the first President of the Club and who continued in this role until his death in 1903. Sir David was devoted to the sport of cricket and was patron of a number of clubs, providing invaluable financial assistance to them.
The name, West of Scotland Cricket Club was coined by one John McNeill who was very ambitious for the Club, and who envisaged it becoming the MCC of Scotland. All-England Elevens were invited to the Club and other matches of a similar nature arranged, which included the first ever visit of an Australian team to Scotland in 1878.
Tours of England were also undertaken and it was during the first match of one such Tour in July 1885 that a West cricketer achieved a world record which stood for 12 years. The match was against Priory Park C.C. (Chichester) during which Mr. J. S. Carrick batted for two days, achieving a score of 419 not out.
In 1891, Dr. W.G. Grace brought a team to Partick and won by an innings and 33 runs. By 1922 the Club had a membership of over 500, seating accommodation for 3,500 and a turnstile at every entrance. A reconstructed pavilion was opened in April 1923 by the then President, Mr. Peter Dawson and a new scoreboard built in 1936.
Following damage sustained during World War II extensive repairs were made to both the pavilion and ground which included the acquisition of turf from Renfrew Golf Course.
Between 1965 and 1970 Scotland played matches at Hamilton Crescent against New Zealand, the West Indies, MCC and Ireland. In August 1975 a benefit match was held for the then Club Professional, Salahuddin, and those taking part included Colin Cowdrey, Mike Denness, Intikhab Alam, Majid Khan, Asif Iqbal and Sir Garfield Sobers.
Ongoing improvements to the ground and buildings enabled West to continue hosting Senior and International matches and a visit by a Pakistan touring side in 1982 was followed by a series of Benson and Hedges One Day matches between Scotland and Gloucestershire, Leicestershire, Yorkshire, Derbyshire and Northamptonshire. In July 1989 3,500 spectators watched Scotland play Australia. Following this, Scotland also played Essex and Kent at Hamilton Crescent.
West has become a regular venue for the Scottish Cup Final, held at the end of August and the tradition of hosting Representative Fixtures has continued with five European Championship Matches being held at Hamilton Crescent during 2000, namely Holland v. Ireland, Gibraltar v. Portugal, England Cricket Board XI v. Scotland, France v. Greece and Holland v. Denmark.
[edit] Youth System
The Indoor School was opened in February 1957 and was the first of its kind in Scotland. It has produced an array of youngsters who have come through the ranks and now play an impressive level of cricket. Moneeb Iqbal now plays at Durham and made his first class debut in 2006. In this game Iqbal took a stunning catch on the deep square leg boundary and it has been said that Iqbal is a favourite of the then Durham captain Michael Hussey.
Another player who came through the ranks of this prestigious club is Ian Young, Young was a member of the MCC young cricketers programme and this stylish left-hander has played extremely well during his period at Lord's. Young returned to Scotland for the 2007 season and will captain the team in 2008. More notably Ian was twelfth man for the English test side when they played the infamous test against Pakistan at the The Oval in 2006.
Another product of the coveted West Youth system is Craig Wright, the ex-Captain of the Scottish national team. Wright left West of Scotland for Carlton CC due to work commitments. He has now moved back west to the controversial Greenock CC all-stars and captained them to SNCL Premier League Success in 2007.
[edit] 2006 Season
West of Scotland Cricket Club were promoted to the SNCL Premier league following a final day nailbiter in 2006 and returned to the highest level possible for a Scottish club to play at for the 2007 season. Stand-out performances came from Scottish International Douglas Lockhart with 802 runs at an average of 57.29, Indian pro Barrington Rowland with nearly 1000 runs at an average of 56.24 and the experienced trundlers Mark Gilchrist and John Cameron who took a combined total of 56 wickets at averages of 15.97 and 10.88 respectively. Able support was provided by Ricky Windows, Aussie amateur Tim McKay and Gautam 'G' Hariharan. Young Gregg Watson also scored his first SNCL century with 103*.
[edit] 2007 Season
Following the resignation of the 1st XI captain Mark Gilchrist the then vice-captain Gregg Watson took over and despite an unsuccessful season team spirit and morale was restored.
The season started poorly for the West with defeats to Uddingston and Ferguslie. However, in the Uddingston match, star opener Dougie Lockhart suffered a knee injury which was to put the powerful opener out for the season. However, Ian Young and Barry Rowland made encouraging starts on their return to West with innings of 63 (against Ferguslie) and 90 (against Uddingston). Then, in an all-Glasgow affair West restricted the Clydesdale heavyweights to 185-4 in their allotted 47 overs. However, as was to be the theme of the year, West subsided meekly to 120 all out.
They then recorded their first win of the season against southsiders Poloc by 17 runs, Barry Rowland in the runs with a superb 101, while Tim McKay supported with 58*. Ian Cran was the main wicket-taker with 3-45. However, seven losses and six wash-outs meant that West were already relegated by the time they recorded their second win, in a match against second-bottom Heriots on the final day of the season.
Ian Young has been nominated as Captain for 2008 with Douglas Lockhart as Vice Captain. The eleven will be chasing promotion back to the premier division next year.
[edit] Juniors
The current starlets of this junior system are members of a somewhat underachieving under 18s side. However, West has many talented players in its junior system, including 17 year old Cameron Gibb, 16 year old seamer Max Ralston, 15 year old pace bowler Gavin "Guvnor" Smith, Recently turned "Leg Spinner" to "Seamer" 15 year old Chris Ross, Alfred "Alfie" Lloyd who's punishing drives, slog sweeps and cuts make bowlers of the calibre of Moneeb Iqbal sit up and take notice and 11 year old Andrew Umeed, who recently scored 147 in a district U12 tournament. Within the last few years, the West junior section have delivered many things including the achievement of sending out an unknown year old playing U18s cricket by the name of Sunny Ahmed, who dared to go out to face the lightning pace of Scotland U17 bowling allrounder Craig Morrison without protection. Another household name of WOSCC is 14 year old Blair Moffat who memorably made his debut for the 3s in a hoodie and jeans after getting a late call from Captain McKendry. He was quoted as being (by Stewart Murray) "the most unathletic boy I have ever seen" after the "bounce" game which the Ferguslie opener took part in and subsequently ruined the spirit in which it was played.
[edit] 1st XI Players Profiles
| Name | Nat | Batting Style | Bowling Style | Notes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Batsmen | |||||
| Gregg Watson | |
RHB | RM | ||
| Ian Young | |
LHB | RM | ||
| Stewart Leggat | |
RHB | OS | ||
| Ross Brown | |
LHB | LM | ||
| Jamie Burton | |
RHB | RM | ||
| All-rounders | |||||
| David McNulty | |
RHB | RFM | ||
| Craig Brown | |
RHB | OS | ||
| Tim Mckay | |
RHB | OS | ||
| Wicket-keepers | |||||
| Douglas Lockhart | |
RHB | Scotland ODI player | ||
| John McGrady | |
RHB | |||
| Bowlers | |||||
| Ian Cran | |
RHB | LFM | ||
| Nikhil Sood | |
RHB | OS | ||
| Aftab Talpur | |
RHB | RM | ||
| Ricky Windows | |
RHB | RM | ||
| Gordon Goudie | |
RHB | RF | Scotland ODI player | |
| Gavin Smith | |
RHB | RMF | ||
