KESWICK CRICKET CLUB
Sponsored by Lake District Hotels
A watchable cricket match requires; good batting, good bowling and a good crowd… and at Keswick Cricket Club on Thursday 31st July that’s exactly what it got. Staff from Lake District Hotels gathered at Fitz Park to watch and support their fellow work colleagues, play a proper game of cricket, against Keswick Cricket Club’s selected team.
Over the past few weeks staff from Lake District Hotels Ltd have come together to form a cricket team, with the end goal to play against Keswick Cricket Club to add a bit of fun to the sponsorship. The team was led by Philip Knight, who works for the Queens Hotel and back in the day used to play cricket for Keswick 1st team.
The match started with Keswick Cricket Club batting, scoring an impressive 131. With various team members of Lake District Hotels standing out from the rest, for their excellent bowling and fielding techniques, as John Miller (Wicket Keeper for Lake District Hotels) caught out the first player on the 2nd ball of the match and Tom Sullivan taking praise for best bowler.
Lake District Hotels innings started with Neels Ferreira (General Manager for the Skiddaw Hotel) batting, scoring 35 runs, taking the award of best batsman. Lake District Hotels continued to play well, with Keswick Cricket Club managing to take out 7 of their batsmen. Things were getting tense and players were under pressure as the match came down to the last point. Lake District Hotel’s sent on their 9th batsman Glen Barr from the Inn on the Lake, who managed to get the winning run on the last ball, giving victory to Lake District Hotels.
The ‘Man of the Match’ award went to Darren Love, Restaurant Manager for the Inn on the Lake. Darren currently plays cricket for Patterdale and his talent and love for cricket was clearly visible throughout the match.
Dani Hope commented, “Keswick Cricket Club have done an amazing job in allowing us to practise and use their kit down at the club, in organising Thursday night’s match and for creating a fantastic atmosphere. It’s been a pleasure to sponsor Keswick Cricket Club and we are looking forward to the next two years of sponsorship. A big thank you goes out to all of the staff that took part and to the staff that came along to support our team; it turned out to be a great evening. Well done everyone!”
As part of Lake District Hotels sponsorship, Keswick Cricket Club invited Dani Hope (Marketing Director of Lake District Hotels) down to the grounds, along with Henry Olonga (former Zimbabwe international cricketer) to cut the ribbon and officially open Keswick Cricket Club’s new nets.
Henry’s days as an international fast bowler are now over and he spends most of his time as a musician, artist, photographer and campaigner. Currently in Keswick with his family for the Keswick Convention and to join in the Keswick cricket club’s cricket festival week, he stayed a while to see the start of our match.
It’s a small world…
Neels Ferreira, General Manager for the Skiddaw Hotel was pleasantly surprised to bump into Henry, it turned out that the pair, both originally from Zimbabwe actually played a game of rugby together in 1988 for Zimbabwe U13 vs Kenya. It seems Neels is something of a secret sportsman, they won that match too with Henry scoring the only try.
