SUFFOLK secured a decent third place amid fierce opposition at the Minor Counties Under-12s Tournament at the Royal Hospital School last week.

Stuart Watson

SUFFOLK secured a decent third place amid fierce opposition at the Minor Counties Under-12s Tournament at the Royal Hospital School last week.

The hosts lost their opening match to a strong Buckinghamshire side who dismissed them for just 67 before comfortably knocking off the runs.

However, Suffolk bounced back strongly from that early setback to the eventual champions and went on to win all of their remaining four matches.

First they beat Cumbria, their impressive attack bowling the opponents out for just 117 after they had set a target of 163 for three, before Lincolnshire were beaten, Suffolk limiting them to 131 for seven, a target they reached for the loss of just three wickets.

These results in the group stages put Suffolk into a third/fourth play-off against Hertfordshire - reduced to a Twenty20 format due to the weather - who they duly beat by 11 runs.

Suffolk coach Carl Webb-Snowling said: “Third out of eight is not bad at all considering how good the standard was. There were some good little cricketers out there who should go on to be very good players.

“We saw over 500 boys at county trials for all the age groups last year and took through only small squads. Those squads then undertook a ten week period of winter training in preparation for the summer and tournaments like this.

“The Under-12s are a promising squad, some of them are already playing senior cricket. The baulk of the squad will stay together as Under-13s next year which is exciting.

“These years, between the ages of 10 and 13, is where they really learn their cricket. It is at this stage where they push on from the pairs cricket they play at a young age and really learn what I call proper cricket.

“With 45 overs per innings they have to learn tactical awareness and application and really have to prove their skills.”