Softball Cricket Festival at Bilton: Joyous and competitive

The end of the week hadn’t promised too much – as the weather looked decidedly dodgy. Those wonderful people at the Met Office had predicted thunder and lightning, hail and storms, and in our small part of the world…enough rain to shake more than a few sticks at!

I’d somehow managed to dodge most of the rain on Friday as I covered Yorkshire Men’s second-eleven playing Durham; and unbelievably seen a whole game in the Airedale and Wharfedale League (Beckwithshaw vs Collingham & Linton) on Saturday before the first real drops fell in the evening.

Was Sunday going to be an isobar and weather front too far?

At the beginning of the week, I’d looked at my options for games that I had pencilled in on my schedule at the start of the season.

I had noted a double header at Headingley on Sunday – with Yorkshire Men taking on Leicestershire in the Vitality Blast North T20, and Yorkshire Women also hosting Leicestershire Foxes in the Vitality Blast League Two.

Before I sent my email to get a media pass, I decided to have a look at Play-Cricket to see what other women’s games were going ahead. Then up on my social media feed came a graphic from Bilton Cricket Club about a softball festival featuring a number of teams from around the area.

So, my mind was made up, there was a change of plans and I was looking forward to visiting Bilton again.

The festival was taking place throughout the day, with the Juniors starting to play their group games in the morning, and the senior teams playing their group games from 1pm.

Unfortunately, due to a previously booked photoshoot, I was unable to get to the festival in the morning…but made sure I wouldn’t miss the start of the afternoon’s competition.

Hundreds at Bilton

As I got out of the car, I was surprised by the sheer numbers of people there, the club was buzzing with activity. Sometimes when I visit cricket clubs to cover games, I can literally be the only non-participant there, so it is always a real pleasure to find a few hundred people in and around the pitch enjoying playing or simply watching cricket.

I wandered over to the pavilion and introduced myself to Matt Thomas who was one of the organisers, and at that moment on mic duty. The briefest of chats [as he was very busy and didn’t need to hear me rambling on], I took a copy of the afternoon’s fixtures and pitch layout.

The club had brought in a drinks and sweets van, a travelling pizza vendor, an ice cream van, and had their bar open. So, there was plenty of choice and I can confirm the coffee was great, the pizza hit the spot…and I am neither confirming or denying having a double-scoop with a flake!

As I strolled back to the car to fetch the cameras, I started to try and work out how I could cover all the teams that were being played that afternoon…not as easy as I first hoped it would be!

Bilton were hosting Ripon, Studley Royal, Beckwithshaw and Knaresborough Cricket Clubs. Of those five clubs, Bilton, Studley Royal and Ripon had two teams taking part, the teams would be playing each other in two groups, on four pitches, and over three rounds of games.

Being a simple Irishman, it was making my head hurt as to how I could best get to see all eight teams play!

With my lack of intelligence (artificial or otherwise)…I resolved to cover an innings at a time, knowing that I could concentrate on each game briefly before moving on to the next; but also knowing that I would probably miss one or two teams batting.

My first round of fixtures were on pitches one and two; where Bilton One’s were taking on Studley Royal Ones, followed by Ripon Ones taking on Knaresborough. I am going to be honest with you, I can’t give you a detailed match report for each of the games…as I didn’t see any of them to completion, and for that – I apologise.

I must admit to a sense of frustration at not being able to see individual games to the final ball, as I always enjoy the nuances of games going down to the wire, or the tension when runs and/or wickets are needed.

The second round of fixtures were on pitches three and four; featuring Bilton Twos against Studley Royal Twos; and Ripon Twos against Beckwithshaw. 

With the final round of games now having their starting times a little staggered, I began by watching Bilton Ones playing Knaresborough before moving on to covering a mixture of Ripon against Beckwithshaw and finally Bilton Twos completing the day against Studley Royal Twos.

Competitive and joyous

By stumps at the end of the day, I think I’d earned my degree in Cricket Coverage Scheduling! [between me and you, I’m hoping for at least a 2:1].

I’ve said it before, softball is competitive cricket for all, played in a joyous atmosphere and all the games I saw on Sunday didn’t change that opinion.

The cheering from the sidelines, the excitement of hitting boundaries, and the jumping for joy as wickets were hit or catches were taken reinforces my satisfaction of covering days like Sunday.

From the play I saw, all the teams featured players that could easily transition to different versions of the game [if they haven’t already].

This form of cricket encourages every player to get involved in batting, bowling and fielding; there are no players that are there solely to make up the numbers.

This is one of the huge strengths of softball cricket, and something that I actually love about it.

From the conversations overheard, the chats I had with various players, and subsequently photos shared on social media by the teams, I can confirm that the day was undoubtably a resounding success – and it didn’t rain!

I could have been at Headingley covering county cricket, but I know I made the right choice this Sunday to have headed down Bilton Lane…thank you to everyone there for allowing me to sit on the boundary ropes covering the festival of cricket.

Want to read more?

Here are all of Mark’s articles and photos on Cricket Yorkshire. There’s also our Women and Girls Hub here on the website.

To see more of his photography, you can visit caughtlight.com or he’s @caughtlight on Twitter/X.

There’s also the Caught Light Photography Facebook page.

I also highly recommend his blog called Leica Moments which includes days out at grounds around Yorkshire.