Illingworth stars in Costa Rica league

Costa Rica league saw a key match between CCCCR and Corsair. Corsairs needed to win in order to be tied with CCCCR at the top of the table. CCCCR batted first and were about 20 for 6 when Richard Illingworth and Shane Catford came together and put on 100. If it had not been for the local rule that you must retire on reaching 50, Richard might well have gone on to score his age. In spite of another 50 from Ben Smith, this stand proved decisive and CCCCR won by 30 runs. It was a distinguished effort by Richard Illingworth but Shane Catford was Man of the Match with his 50 and bowling of 4 for 3.

The other two games took place at Turrialba in the grounds of CATIE. It is a delightful place about 2 hours out of San Jose on the old road to Limon. Corsairs played two limited over games against Raleigh in conditions that started cloudy and turned to drizzle at the end.

Corsairs had no difficulty winning the first game. They were looking forward to a win in the second game but Raleigh captain, Julian Oliver, had other ideas. While the Corsairs relaxed, he had his team out there practicing and discussing tactics. Clearly Julian and John Cecil-Wright had things sorted and Raleigh won by 16 runs with the aid of some excellent wicket keeping from Julian and remarkable figures of 5 for 1 run from John.

Visit to Nicaragua Next month we will be concentrating on the trip to Granada, Nicaragua to play against the home team and El Salvador.