Ian Cockbain Reports From New Zealand
10 December 2012
Ian Cockbain is spending the winter playing club cricket in New Zealand and is keeping Gloucestershire supporters up to date with his life there by writing regular articles for this website.
In his second blog, Ian talks about the weather, cricket and his attempts to become an expert surfer!
"Well, I’ve been here in Christchurch for a couple of months now and have settled in very well, despite the terrible start to the summer weather-wise. Having had my fair share of the rain over the previous six months, it was the last thing I wanted!
"After our first dramatic win of the season, the mighty Marist Harewood CC got on a bit of a roll and we won our next three games with another nail-biter thrown in, which didn’t help my nerves.
"Despite us winning four from four, our bowlers had pulled us out of trouble on a few occasions with the batters (including myself) finding it difficult to score any big runs on the difficult wickets we faced due to all the poor weather.
"Unfortunately, the wheels have since fallen off and we lost our next three games, falling to chase down a few low scores. This saw us freefall from comfortably top of the table to out of the finals zone. We had our last game this weekend in the one-day tournament and went into it needing a win and another result going our way to reach the semi-finals.
"After all the rain and pretty cold conditions (I know you all feel sorry for me), the weather decided to pick up and we finally got a few warmish days, so I didn’t hesitate to make my first trip down to the beach.
"The sea looked very refreshing, so I decided to take a dip and refreshing it certainly was. Not realising the South Pacific Ocean wasn’t as nice and warm as the sea in Australia, I got a bit of shock as I bound into the freezing water without dipping the toes first.
"With the weather forecast to be nice for a week or so, a friend of mine asked me to go surfing with him. I was pretty keen to give it a go as the last time I tried was five years ago in Melbourne where a 'friend' took me and thought it would be funny to see me get smashed by these monster waves!!
"This time the waves were pretty tame and, having donned my wetsuit, I definitely looked the part. But just like my last attempt, I was useless and felt rather embarrassed by these little school kids riding the waves beside me like they were seasoned pros.
"That’s it for now, but I’ll keep you updated on how my surfing is progressing – oh, and the cricket!"
Coey
