Blog

The Cricketing Emu's tour of Scotland

James Psarakis | May 28, 2024

The Emu Cricket Club has a proud tradition of giving young cricketers from Northern NSW the opportunity to aspire and represent their region internationally.

The “Emus” as they are affectionately known was founded by Jim White in the 1940s and each year a touring squad of Under 21 players set off on tours to New Zealand, Argentina, and Europe.

Each year selected players from NSW North Coast, Hunter Valley, North West, and Northern Tablelands would assemble in Tamworth for the JS White Under 21’s Colts Carnival over 3 days in January

From the carnival, the Emu’s were selected. Dougie Walters would be considered one of the most famous Emu’s.

Jim White simply wanted, “To provide an important agent towards inspiring young men with a correct proportionate outlook on their civic, social and sporting lives,”

For various reasons the JS White carnival became difficult to coordinate and there hasn’t been one for about 8 years.

The “Emu” players are proud cricketers with a tremendous sense of belonging and through the great work of Peter Clifford, former Emu, and NSW & Queensland First Class Cricketer, a number of Emu tours have still progressed.

The 2019 Emus tour was to Scotland and I was fortunate to be selected.

The 2019 Emu’s included a few players over the age of 21 and also included a few Queensland players. Peter arranged the tour through his Scotland connections where he played as a professional for about 4 years during his career

The tour began like all good touring parties when players don’t necessarily know each other very well. At Sydney airport, in the bar.

We arrived in Glasgow on Saturday 8th June and headed to the small town of Greenock. After the long flight, we wanted to familiarise ourselves with the town and found a couple of local cricket games.

What we found interesting was the post-game discussions with a couple of locals. They established we were a touring party from Australia and were to play against the Scotland Performance Academy later in the tour. The Performance Academy is a mixture of 16-24-year-old athletes from all over Scotland who are pushing for a spot in Scotland A and B teams.

After a few drinks, it became clear some of the young locals weren’t overly complimentary of their Academy. They wanted us to “give it to them”

Our first game was against the Western District Cricket Union at Ferguslie.

Arriving at the ground we instantly noticed how big one of the boundaries was to the wicket. Our players were scrambling about fielding positions and the thought of how much running between wickets we’d be doing.

We lost the toss and were sent into bat on a typical Scottish wicket, green and a little soft.

We lost our first 4 wickets with only 30 runs on the board before I was joined by Alec Baldwin and we were able to steady the ship before a mix up between the wickets. Alex finished unbeaten on 58 and was well supported by Ben McMahon who made 30 and the Emu’s were all out for 162 of 37 overs.

Western Districts started their innings slowly, saw off our opening bowlers but succumbed when Ben McMahon was introduced into the attack. He picked up 2 quick wickets and it would have been 3 if his brother Hayden had held on to a catch shortly after.

We soon got into our rhythm and with a consistent fall of wickets, Western Districts were bowled out for 111 with Scott Brennan the pick of the bowlers, collecting 4 for 14 off his 6 overs.

The obvious highlight was the hospitality post-match with some boys experiencing their first UK tea.

We played a number of other games against local cricket clubs and thankfully won each game.

We were then to move onto Hamilton Crescent to play against the Scottish 40s Club. We were due to travel by bus but unfortunately, the bus wasn’t big enough to take all the players, management and equipment.

As captain, I thought it was my responsibility to give up my seat and thankfully coerced one of the fast bowlers to join me on an hour-long train trip to the ground.

We finally got to the ground and happy to bat first. The 40s Club were a player short for about 6 overs so one of our bowlers put his hand up to field for the opposition. 2 overs into our innings and our opener Remy Holdsworth skies the ball and guess who was under the high ball.

Tom Burley looked so comfortable until the ball hit his hands, then chest, then ground. Afterwards Remy was very polite as he thanked Tom for helping move from 0 to 51 retired.

We finished with 259 and bowled the 40s Club out for less than 100.

The after match drinks were great fun as the 40s Club members shared some great stories of their cricketing endeavors.

We’d played 7 games back to back and we were now due to play 3 games against the Scottish Performance Academy. Our bowlers were feeling the pinch, the batters were getting used to the wickets and for whatever reason, the dislike of the Academy team grew louder.

The continuous chatter by the locals worked in our favour as it pumped us up to make sure we were on our game against the young professionals.

The first game was on Tuesday 18 June and we arrived at the beautiful Ayr Cricket Club a tad late, 50 minutes before the start of play. It was ok because after 7 games in 8 days we weren’t exactly jumping out of our skins for an arduous warm up.

Whilst we may not have been, the Academy boys were.

To their credit, they were very professional, with plenty of chatter and balls flying all over the place. They had more support staff than players.

As their energy levels rose, the soreness in our bodies seemed to rise as well. As we tried to loosen up the captain lost the toss and we’re in the field. The bowlers weren't happy at all.

We sharpened ourselves pretty quickly as we reminded ourselves what the locals had been saying and hoping we'd do to the young professionals.

Our bowlers did a fine job as we bowled the Academy team out for 217 with Ben McMahon, Angus McNeil, and James Psarakis picking up 2 wickets each.

I’ll admit we may have been a little chirpy in the field and became a little concerned for our opening batsman as they were also the two youngest members of the team.

The young fellas started slowly but did a great job in laying the platform as we reached 3 for 91 off 20 overs. We passed the Academy’s team total in the 40th over only 5 wickets. There was some good batting by Nick Cutler 57 off 73, Michael Dawson 33 off 41, Alec Baldwin 54 off 40 and James Psarakis 62 off 57.

Whilst we relaxed in the players seating area, the Academy boys had a team meeting. It lasted about one and half-pints.

We won the next game by 93 runs in another well-rounded display before we moved to the T20 format.

The T20 game was an exciting game of cricket. Unfortunately, we lost by 1 run and on the very last ball.

After 3 hard-fought days of cricket, the highlight for the boys was the outstanding tea and hospitality that comes with playing at such lovely Scottish grounds.

A super tour had come to an end with all players sending a huge thank you to the coach Peter Clifford and team manager Peter Parker. We also made special mention of Paul Coffey who was our tour guide, one of the fathers and an enjoyable companion off the field.

We hope we lived up to the Emu tradition. We were certainly grateful for the opportunity.

Emu’s Touring Team – Scotland 2019

Alec Baldwin

Scott Brennan

Tom Burley

Daniel Cranitch

Nick Cutler

Michael Dawson

Remy Holsworth

Ben McMahon

Hayden McMahon

Angus McNeil