The Beamer

Standing at 6ft 7in, Jack Murphy inevitably has big feet yet the 18-year- old from Tenby has some big shoes to fill as he spends a winter in New Zealand honing his craft for next year’s cricket season at home. Jack Murphy pictured with Haverfordwest's Simon Holliday Playing for Whangerai Boys High School in the Northland district competition, this year’s Glamorgan Academy player of the year is following in the footsteps of Alun Evans in playing for the club and he is out there under Evans’ recommendation after the Kiwi club called in search of a replacement. Evans had a stellar time in New Zealand and ended up playing for the Northern District first class team yet he had no hesitation in suggesting Murphy when the club came calling after seeing the all-rounder in close quarters whilst playing for Ammanford in the South Wales Premier League. Capable of bowling at pace and good enough to open the batting for the East Carmarthenshire club, Murphy is certainly a

Outrageous cricket shots like this enthral crowds. Will a change in our format see them played in Pembrokeshire ‘The older I get the better I was’, so said a T-shirt being sold in County Sports, Haverfordwest this summer. While it’s true that memories of past glories stay fresher in the mind than failures, there could be a degree of truth in this witty idiom, especially if you pay attention to cricketers that have retired or are in the process if doing so as nearly all of them proclaim that the game in Pembrokeshire cricket is not as good as it once was. They’ve been saying it for years which suggests that cricket in the shire is so bad that any fool could play it; or that it’s non-existent at all if indeed it has declined year or year. The fact remains that playing from the sidelines no matter what standard is always easier than when out in the middle. But have standards really dropped or are these the words of ageing players bitter that father time has caught u