Seemingly every season in the Horsham Cricket Association, a handful of international recruits come to the Wimmera to play Australia's favourite international sport.
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For 2019-2020, Laharum have secured the services of two Englishmen, Liverpool's Anthony Molloy and east London's Adam Barber.
RICHARD CRABTREE sat down with the two new faces to chat about the move to Australia.
What brought you both to Horsham?
ANTHONY (AM): I've always wanted to play cricket over here. (Laharum secretary) Josh Mahoney played over at LIverpool, so I got to know Josh and he said I should come over. I'm living with him over here now, unfortunately! Hopefully I'll be able to get another year on my visa and play soccer over here as well. That's the plan anyway.
What particularly drew you to Australia?
AM: The weather. And the cricket season.
ADAM (AB): I always wanted to go to Australia. It didn't have to be cricket, but I thought why not play cricket over there. So I went through an agency CricX ... they helped me finding a club, and a place to stay with Josh.
Two games into the year and I have to say, not great scores so far fellas. Adam with six runs while Anthony has four from two innings. What's going on there?
AB: My bowling is going alright, but I'll admit the batting hasn't been great.
AM: Not a great start. These astro turf pitches, we don't play on them back home. We only play on turf pitches. The astro has a bit more bounce, a bit quicker. Back home it's just slow and low.
There are a few turf pitches around. You'll get onto one eventually.
AM: I'll probably score even less on the turf pitches than I'm doing now, now that I've said that.
Would you both consider yourselves all-rounders?
AM: I'd like to think so. At the moment, no.
AB: I'd say I'm more of a bowler.
AM: I'd say I'm probably more of a fielder at the minute. But we open the bowling together.
What do you think of the standard of cricket out here so far?
AM: It's almost exactly what I've been playing back home.
AB: It's pretty much nearly the same. We played in different leagues, but for me it's almost the same as well.
We've just come out of the English summer. It was a pretty massive summer of cricket over there, with the World Cup and the Ashes. What was it like as a spectator to be over there?
AM: Well the Ashes weren't great. We can gloss over that and just talk about the World Cup if you'd like.
AB: The World Cup was mad. I watched the final at our club. We had a huge projector. We were just playing a friendly inter-club game at the time, but every time something would happen we stopped playing and went in to watch it ... we just went mental in the super over.
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AM: Mine was quite different to yours. I was quite hungover at home. I was just lying there being sick in a bucket while watching it. I couldn't quite get into the spirit; I was in the worst state ever.
You both say you've been loving the weather so far, but it's going to get 15 degrees hotter at times over the next few months. How do you think you'll both cope?
AM: I can't cope now. Even when we arrived, it was like 17-18 degrees, and that is hot back home. We were walking around with shorts on, everyone else had jumpers and jeans on. I was like, 'the sun is out. Get some shorts on.' I couldn't believe it.
AB: I think we'll be okay, but we probably won't be able to do as much as we hope, just because we've never experienced the heat before.
AM: We might spend all our money on sun-cream. And a sunhat.
You're facing Colts this week - I suppose you don't know a lot about them, but they're another side new to A Grade, and have lost their first two matches this season. Is there anything you've been focusing on at training ahead of this weekend?
AM: Not really. We've just been copping so much stick at training. Even when you're batting in the nets and you play and miss, everyone just starts laughing. Like, give me a break.
AB: The worst thing as well, is we get in the nets and nobody will get us out. But as soon as you get out there during a game, it's like...
AM: A whole different ball game.
AB: Like, 'what are we doing?'. In the nets, we would never play the shots we've gone out to. The first game I went to play a cover drive, and was about five minutes too early and spooned it. The next one, I don't even know what happened. I went to go down the wicket against a spinner and just missed the ball. Clean bowled.
AM: Mine's worse. First game, fourth ball, I ran down the pitch and tried to hit it for six. Caught at slip.
The first game, you were chasing too, weren't you? And you weren't too far off Blackheath-Dimboola?
AM: We were in an okay spot, but we just collapsed. Everyone gave their wicket away. We were just trying to hit sixes every ball.
Sounds like something you might address...
AM: Definitely. No more slogs down the wicket.
The second game I went out caught and bowled, just knocked it back to him.
AB: That was unlucky though. He absolutely smashed it, it was just a great catch.
Have you heard a good piece of sledging so far?
AM: I haven't heard one. Not one. Both teams we've played have been nice, to be completely honest. We've only been hearing it from our teammates, which is all week to be honest. It never stops.
I know it's early, but who do you reckon are the best cricketers on your side?
AM: I think Ben Peucker's the best player.
AB: Ben is definitely the best batsman. Damian Bunworth is a great bowler as well, and a good all-around cricketer from what I've seen. Johnno (Daniel Johnson) is another one. He played A Grade the first week and deserves a mention.
AM: Johnno is a club hero. He came in at number 11 the first round and went out trying to slog. It was a full on golf swing.
- Nominate a member of your club for our weekly Friday cricket profile; email details to newsdesk@mailtimes.com.au or phone the sports desk on 5362 0000
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