By Charles Randall

23 February 2015


Folkestone CC were able to celebrate a return to the top flight in the Kent Cricket League and laud the selection of their promising seam-bowler Hugh Bernard for the England Under-19 tour to Australia.

One could safely say that Folkestone, with their futuristic pavilion at Three Hills and thriving youth sector, belong in the Premier Division after an absence of eight years, and the recognition of Bernard came as a pleasant surprise.

The England tourists begin their trip with a warm-up match in Perth on March 31 and play five one-dayers against Australia and a four-day Test after an absence of a decade. Australia Under-19s are due to tour England this summer.

The England selectors brought Bernard into their tour party from outside the development programme to bolster the seam bowling after his eye-catching season for Folkestone and Kent second team.

Folkestone – the club that produced James Tredwell and Geraint Jones for Kent and England – owed much to the consistency of three bowlers for their runners-up spot behind Tunbridge Wells. The lively Bernard finished with 35 wickets, the long-serving Indian all-rounder Himanshu Waingankar took 37 with his spin, and Sam Ireland weighed in with 31. Waingankar carried the batting in an incredibly consistent league summer, hitting 12 fifties and a highest score of 99. He scored 921 runs at an average of 61.4.

Folkestone moved to their new clubhouse in 2013 in an extensive redevelopment of the old County Ground at Cheriton Road, funded by a donation from the Roger De Haan Charitable Foundation. Known as Three Hills Sports Park, the new facility provides a centre of excellence for cricket, hockey and netball.

Callum Taylor, the Swardeston and Norfolk prospect, has a chance to excel in Australia after his sensational entry into professional cricket at the age of 16, when he hit 73 off 40 balls for Essex seconds against Gloucestershire at Bristol. He further enhanced his season by becoming the youngest player to score a century for Norfolk in the Minor Counties Championship.

The England Development Programme chairman of selectors David Graveney said the tour represented a “fantastic development opportunity” for all the players and  particularly the chance to play a four-day match at the WACA.

He said: “With all but one of the players selected eligible for the 2016 ICC Under-19 World Cup in Bangladesh next February, this tour, along with the subsequent reciprocal series on home soil in August, forms a hugely important part of England’s preparation for that tournament.

“This will be the first time we have played Australia Under-19s since we beat them in the third place play-off off match in last year’s ICC Under-19 World Cup in UAE. That was a closely contested affair and we expect this series to be equally hard fought.”

Graveney added “The fact that 2015 is an Ashes year for the men and women will only heighten interest in this Under-19 series, and I am certain that all 16 of the England players selected for the tour will be keen to set the tone for the summer.”

The head of the development programme Andy Hurry will oversee the month-long tour from March 25–April 25, with support from coaches Tim Boon and Ian Brunnschweiler. All the matches will be played in the Perth and Bunbury area. The four-day match takes place at the WACA on April 6–9, followed by the one-day series.

Tom Moores, son the England coach Peter, is one of the players selected for the current England development visit to Dubai where a series against Pakistan Under-17 has been scheduled.

England Under-19 in Australia

Hugh Bernard (Kent)
Mason Crane (Hampshire)
Ryan Davies (Kent)
Will Davis (Derbyshire)
Aneurin Donald (Glamorgan)
Ben Green (Somerset/Devon)
Haseeb Hameed (Lancashire)
Max Holden (Middlesex)
Mosun Hussain (Yorkshire)
Saqib Mahmood (Lancashire)
Matt Parkinson (Lancashire/Staffordshire)
Brad Taylor (Hampshire)
Callum Taylor (Essex/Norfolk)
Aaron Thomason (Warwickshire)
Jared Warner (Yorkshire)
Joe Weatherley (Hampshire)

England Development squad in Dubai v Pakistan

Martin Andersson (Middlesex)
Ed Barnes (Yorkshire)
George Bartlett (Somerset)
Sam Curran (Surrey)
Jordan Garrett (Gloucestershire)
Arthur Godsal (Middlesex)
Tom Haines (Sussex)
Max Holden (Middlesex)
Tom Moores (Nottinghamshire)
George Panayi (Warwickshire)
David Sayer (Leicestershire)
Andrew Thomas (Middlesex)
Ben Twohig (Worcestershire)
Sam Underdown (Somerset)
Saif Zaib (Northamptonshire)