MPCA 2019-20: French Island Cricket Club enjoying success
French Island Cricket Club has been celebrating wins and centuries in the MPCA, a year after battling for survival.
South East
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A year ago French Island Cricket Club was struggling to find enough players to field a side and facing a bleak future.
But a year is a long time in local cricket and the Island’s fortunes have taken a turn for the better.
Not only has French Island got a full complement of players but it has started the season with four straight wins to sit atop the MPCA A1 ladder.
And, significantly, one of its stalwarts has celebrated a landmark achievement.
Skipper Matt Spark scored his maiden century in Round 3, a match-winning 105 not out off 118 balls against Mornington at Citation Oval in Mt Martha.
“It took about 20 seasons,” 32-year-old Spark said.
“I probably hadn’t given up on the thought of it (happening) but I didn’t expect it either.”
Spark, who “tonned up” a week after dipping into the duck pond, has a way to go to catch French Island’s leading century maker, the late Robert Thompson Sr (Matt’s grandfather).
Thompson Sr hit 46 tons and three double centuries for the Islanders.
Spark tells us cricket on French Island is flourishing since the club launched an appeal for recruits last year.
At the time it offered free ferry rides and after-stumps “refreshments’’ to prospective recruits as it battled for survival. It worked.
One of the newcomers, Chris Collins, hammered 733 runs for the Islanders last season, including a century, and this season he’s already peeled off 84 and 56 not out.
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Ben King has returned to French Island after a few seasons at Balnarring and is going well, making runs and taking wickets. He joins both of his brothers to add even more depth to the team. Jake King took 5-29 in a recent game.