Hello from South Africa!
On 12th January Tom Stanton, Lorcan Tucker, Nick Peters and I all arrived in Dublin Airport with the best two months of our lives ahead of us. After a day and a half’s travelling behind us we landed in Port Elizabeth. We were greeted here by Mr Moodley (Muir College sports coordinator) and two current members of the school’s 1XI. From there, we went straight to St Georges Park to watch the third day of the South Africa v’s New Zealand Test match, not a bad first day for us at all!
The next day we started school at Muir College. Straight away we were shocked at the level of discipline; it makes school in Ireland feel like a holiday! Every day we attend four or five classes. We have to do Maths, English, Geography the two we chose were computers and technical graphics (the only two classes with aircon)! Immediately after school we had cricket practice with the 1st XI. The intensity of the training stood out to us, as well as the heat! It has been between 30 and 35 degrees every day so far and according to our classmates it’s on the way up!
We all played our first game for Muir last Saturday against St Andrew’s, one of the best cricketing schools in South Africa! Tom, Nick and Lorcan all played for the 2’s while I played for the 1’s. In the 2’s game St Andrews batted first and scored 145 all out in 55 overs. Tom picked up figures of 4/32. Muir went out hitting from the start and reached the required total 7 down. In the 1’s game St Andrew’s batted first and scored 260-3 in 68 overs, a long time in the field for us! Unfortunately I was out early on in our innings with just 9 to my name. However we batted through for the draw and were 156-7 when play finished.
The next day we went down to school principal Mr Hopley’s boat house on the Kroome river close to St Francis Bay. Here we were treated to our first South African ‘Brai’; it is fair to say I have never eaten as much meat as that in one day in my life so far!! We also made the most of the sun, Tom making too much of it and being burnt all over!
Last Saturday I played for the 1 X1 against York and the three lads played for the 2’s against Despatch. We won by six wickets chasing 160 while Tom took six wickets in the game against Despatch so he is enjoying a fine time here so far with the ball. Lorcan managed to hit the winning runs with a straight six! Nick did not bat but no doubt will get many chances between now and the end of the season. Several of us are also playing for local club side Uitenhage CC in their league game in Port Elizabeth on Sunday.
We are having a ball in South Africa so far and I look forward to blogging again soon!