Two former England cricketers were among those watching the action on the opening day of the 20th Minor Counties Cricket Festival with former Essex and Gloucestershire spin bowler John Childs, now head scout at Essex County Cricket Club, and Essex batsman Tom Westley taking part in a lunchtime question and answer session.
Questions were posed by festival organiser Don Topley as well as family and friends of the youngsters who are playing in the five-day Under-12 tournament.
They spoke about their county and international careers, and offered words of advice on coaching young players - as well as how to deal with times of failure in their careers.

FIXTURES

UNDER-12s

Monday, 29^th July - Day One at 11am                         
Buckinghamshire v Cleveland (Lord’s)
Suffolk v Cumbria (Canterbury)
Norfolk v Lincolnshire (Oval)
North Essex v The Netherlands (Newlands)
Cambridgeshire v Oxfordshire (Riverside)
 
Tuesday, 30^th July - Day Two at 11am
Cambridgeshire v Lincolnshire (Lord’s)
Buckinghamshire v The Netherlands (Canterbury)
Suffolk v Oxfordshire (Oval)
Norfolk v Cleveland (Newlands)
North Essex v Cumbria (Riverside)
 
Wednesday, 31^st July - Day Three at 11am
North Essex v Oxfordshire (Lord’s)
Cambridgeshire v Cleveland (Canterbury)
Buckinghamshire v Cumbria (Oval)
Suffolk v Lincolnshire (Newlands)
Norfolk v The Netherlands (Riverside)
 
Thursday, 1^st August - Day Four at 11am
Norfolk v Cumbria (Lord’s
North Essex v Lincolnshire (Canterbury)
Cambridgeshire v The Netherlands (Oval)
Buckinghamshire v Oxfordshire (Newlands)
Suffolk v Cleveland (Riverside)
 
Friday, 2^nd August - Day Five at 10am
Suffolk v The Netherlands (Lord’s)
Norfolk v Oxfordshire (Canterbury
North Essex v Cleveland (Oval)
Cambridgeshire v Cumbria (Newlands)

UNDER-11s

Day One at 11am - long format       
Suffolk v Invicta  (Lord’s)
London v Cleveland (Canterbury)
Oxfordshire v Lincolnshire (Oval)
Cumbria v Bedfordshire (Newlands)
Huntingdonshire v North Essex (Riverside)
Northumberland v Norfolk (Astro)
 
Day Two at 11am - long format
Northumberland v Bedfordshire (Lord’s)
Lincolnshire v North Essex (Canterbury)
Norfolk v Cleveland (Oval)
Oxfordshire v Huntingdonshire (Newlands)
Invicta v Cumbria (Riverside)
London v Suffolk (Astro)
 
Day Three at 10am - t20
London v Huntingdonshire (Lord’s)
Cleveland v Bedfordshire (Canterbury)
Invicta v Lincolnshire (Oval)
Suffolk v Northumberland (Newlands)
Norfolk v Oxfordshire (Riverside)
Cumbria v North Essex (Astro)
 
Day Three at 2.30pm - t20
Norfolk v Cumbria (Lord’s)
North Essex v Invicta (Canterbury)
London v Lincolnshire (Oval)
Huntingdonshire v Northumberland (Newlands)
Cleveland v Suffolk (Riverside)
Oxfordshire v Bedfordshire (Astro)
 
Day Four at 10am
All fixtures to be confirmed on Tuesday night. This will allow options to all counties to play the duration they want to help with the final day travel arrangements.

2019 PREVIEW

There are now just 14 days to go until the 2019 Minor Counties Cricket Festival at the Royal Hospital School at Holbrook, near Ipswich.

This is the 20th year that the festival has been held - an event which has featured many young cricketers who have gone on to have successful first-class careers.

Once again we will be providing a comprehensive media service throughout both the U12 and U11 festivals with daily updates featuring links to slideshows of action pictures taken by the Everything Local News media service as well as all the day's results and other festival news.

You are receiving this email as you are already a subscriber to the media service for the 2019 festivals - either as a 'newcomer' for this year or because you registered to receive the updates last year.


Please note: 

* If you have been forwarded this email from a friend or participating county and have not yet registered your own email address, you can do so at http://bit.ly/MCCFmediasignup. 

* If you registered to receive the updates for last year's festival and wish to receive the 2019 updates you do not need to register again. 

* If you received the 2018 updates but no longer wish to be on the circulation list please send an email (from the account / email address used last year) to everythinglocalnews@gmail.com with MCCF UNSUBSCRIBE in the subject line.  
 

As well as via these emails, links to the 2019 updates will also be available via the MCCF and Everything Local News Twitter feeds ( @MCCFCricket and @ELNews_). 

Please note that no email address / contact information is passed on to any other organisation and you can ask for your information to be amended or deleted at any time.