Sunday saw the first outing of the years for the Orsett and Thurrock Valkyries, our under 11 girls’ team.
The girls travelled to Chelmsford for the Essex Indoor Countdown Cricket festival. It was their first ever indoor game and this promising team, expertly managed last season by our President, Roger White, didn’t let us down.
Our first game was against a strong Benfleet team. Valkyries Captain Simran Verma opened the batting with Lucie Pugh and the pair slowly but steadily worked their way into the game. Isla Cotter and Maisie Marchant continued the good progress with some good running between the wickets and Evie Barton and Lyra Macanaspie finished the innings with some big hitting.
The Valkyries bowling attach was led by Lyra who managed a wicket with the first ball of the innings! Wickets continued to fall throughout the innings with the girls putting in a great performance of solid, accurate bowling and fielding. The game ended with an Orsett and Thurrock win of 85 runs to 61run.
The second game was against Great Baddow. Having played one game and grasping the new competition format, the girls came out in a much more confident mood. Simran and Lucie piled on the runs with some intelligent batting and running and Isla put in an amazing performance hitting 3 sixes in a row. Again, all the girls took wickets and notable fielding performances included a catch off the netting from Evie and a great dive from Isla to stop a four. The game ended in another win for the Valkyries, 136 runs to 81runs.
The last game was against Kelvedon and the girls were keen to make it a clean sweep of wins. This time we opened with all guns blazing, Simran hitting sixes for fun! Isla went one better from the last game hitting 4 sixes in a row and our last pair, Evie and Lyra blasted fours throughout their overs. Once again, wickets came from the whole team. Maisie took more wickets to be our highest wicket taker of the day and Isla just missed out on a hattrick after taking two caught and bowled in a row. The game ended with our final win 156 runs to 61 runs ensuring the Valkyries won the Tournament.
All the girls had a brilliant day, putting in some amazing performance and having loads of fun. Even their Coach, Terry Hills, was impressed, although he did say they could improve their fielding !!.
U11 girls training continues Thursday nights, 6pm at William Edwards School and we are looking forward to the outdoor season starting in May. Please contact us if you have girls interested in playing cricket as we are keen to develop this successful team even further.

In the Havering U13 indoor league the Knights signed off with a win to go unbeaten over the 9 games. The U12 sharks finished a very respectable mid table in an age group where one year can make a huge amount of difference, U11 Ashton Flood topping the runs and wickets for Lynn Adams' side.