THE PRESIDENT'S LOG, THE CLOSE SEASON, 2021-2022

Many years ago, a person who was aspiring to the Principalship of a school asked one of my colleagues what I did. “Oh, he just walks around the school all day, talking to people,” was the reply.  Now I’m in another role which involves walking around and talking to people, and Philip Smith, the General Manager of Cricket Leinster, has asked if I would like to give a regular account of the places that I’ve been to and some of the people that I’ve met in my travels as President of Cricket Leinster. It’s important to state at the outset that the opinions which I express are personal ones and should not be interpreted as Cricket Leinster policy or intended Cricket Leinster policies.

With Covid restrictions still in place, the close season was devoid of club dinners, and sadly for the most part, the only occasions on which members of the cricket community met during this period were at funerals. I attended funeral services and/or wakes for Ivan Harper, Tom Murphy, Seamus Clinton, Michael Sharp, Podge Hughes, and Paddy Murray. Ar dheis Dé go raibh a n-anamacha uaisle.

At the start of my Presidency, I cut the ribbon at Sports Hub’s new practice facility, and I was assisted in this task by Stella Downes, immediate Past President of Cricket Leinster, and Brenda Hand of Cricket Ireland. On behalf of Cricket Leinster, I accepted Joe Curtis’s wonderful photographic archive, and I met with Mary and Cliodhna Sharp to discuss the Sharp family’s donation to the Cricket Leinster Archive of the records, minutes, and score cards which Michael had kept so meticulously over a forty- year period.

I was asked to say a few words at Tyrrellstown CC’s Awards Evening, and I wasn’t sure what to say, but that has never deterred me before. With Tyrrellstown being in Fingal, I decided to give a very succinct history of cricket in Fingal over the past two hundred years. I gave Brían O’Rourke a lift home, and only for the Satnav on my car, I would still be traversing the multifarious roundabouts in West Dublin. A Board meeting of Cricket Leinster and an interview on NEAR FM with Fergus Carroll were the only other noteworthy events for me in the close season, apart from the publication of a book which I wrote entitled “The Story of Cricket in Fingal”. My wife is hoping to go to Mauritius on the basis of the royalties, and at the time of writing this blog, the first  payment amounted to €8.77, but for some reason, this transaction failed. That is a resumé of the close season, and from this point onwards, I will give details of the places visited and the people that I meet when I “am just walking around”.