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BBC Radio 4 - 92 to 94 FM and 198 Long Wave

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OPEN COUNTRY

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	PROGRAMME INFO

	Saturday 6.10-6.35am Repeated Thursday 1.30-2.00pm


	From Shetland to the Scilly Isles, Open Country travels the UK in search of the stories, the people and the wildlife that make our countryside such a vibrant place. Each week we visit a new area to hear how local people are growing the crops, protecting the environment, maintaining the traditions and cooking the food that makes their corner of rural Britain unique. Email: [email protected] Postal address: Open Country, BBC Radio 4, Birmingham, B5 7QQ.


	LISTEN AGAIN


	Listen to Open Country for 2 July 2005


	PRESENTERS

	HELEN MARK and RICHARD URIDGE



	More about Helen Mark




	More about Richard Uridge


	PROGRAMME DETAILS

	Saturday 2 July 2005
In this season of the Ashes, Open Country gets back to grassroots cricket and visits a keenly fought match with local pride at stake. Thurstonland Cricket Club is perched on a hill near Holmfirth, West Yorkshire in Last of the Summer Wine country. The handsome cricket pitch is bordered by a whitewashed stonewall, which acts as a sightscreen, an Edwardian pavilion and the sound of leather on willow is interspersed by the bleating of sheep and crowing of a cockerel. In front of a crowd of 30 people, drawn from a village of 200 people, Thurstonland take on Flockton, a nearby pit village, in a cup match. Thurstonland Cricket Club Joyce Booth is cricket mad. Her life has revolved around the game since she was a child carrying water from the church to the pavilion to make teas while her father played. In later life making teas was for a good way of meeting young men, courting behind the scoreboard ("played kiss, dare or promise"); she later married a cricketer and her three sons have all turned out for the team. She is now president of the club and vice-president of the league. In the past, cricketers would be drawn from farms, textile mills, engineering and local mental hospital. Harry Broom is now 82, but his innings for the cricket team lasted from the age of 16-60. He recalls an incident in which he had to leave his fielding position to fetch some water for his mother in the pavilion. As he was returning to the pitch carrying two buckets he threw a boundary ball back into play and thought he’d run out the bowler. He reads out a poem penned for the team: "The sun shone down in torrents, From a clear and cloudless sky, The first eleven were batting, And I was standing by, One hundred runs were needed, For Thurstonland to win the match; I pulled, I drove, I cut, Till the bowlers fell down, And the fieldsmen cried ‘enough!’ Then, ‘for goodness sake stop snoring’, Said my wife in deep disgust, And she shook my shoulder with vigor, And my lovely dream went bust." Cricket is a fundamental part of the local cultural tradition. It is not just that local men play for senior sides, but children turn out for junior sides, women often help on the social side, and many elderly people take on administrative roles. Dr Peter Davies, from Huddersfield University, is among the spectators watching the match. He is running a project to establish a cricket archive of the region including an oral history bank, community photographers, and artists to depict local cricketing landscapes. He says village cricket teams are under pressure from development and also competition from other leisure activities. In urban areas there are some Asian clubs with great players but they struggle to get volunteers to organise the club because of different cultural roles - particularly women serving teas and mixing with men. Cricket heritage project As players go in for tea, its starts to rain so Richard Uridge climbs the ladder to the scorer's box to speak to Andrew Pearson - nicknamed "Statto". He says behind the dry statistics are personalities, characters and social history. He is hooked by cricket, the pace, the dramatic collapses and relationships formed over the long games. The weather takes a turn for the worse, not just "rain stops play" but thunderstorms, dramatic fork lightening and rain flowing across the pitch. The umpire stops the game with Thurstonland 218-5 after 45 overs. Flockton will have to wait another week before they can take to the crease. Post script: in the event Flockton batted well and scored 190-9. Thurstonland won the cup match by 28 runs. Email Open Country: [email protected] The BBC is not responsible for external web sites

	RELATED LINKS BBC Holiday Category BBC Country file