Stenhousemuir celebrate successful cricket campaign at club's awards night

Peter Hamilton (L) took home the second XI’s best fielder trophy

Stenhousemuir Cricket Club celebrated a successful season in 2023 with an awards evening earlier this month that saw a host of members honoured for their efforts across all age groups, from junior level all the way up to first team seniors.

There was a gathering of around 70 people including a large number of young players and their parents as well as senior players and members. The whole evening had been organised by coach Brian Townsend and club president Tom Dickson.

It was heart warming to see so many young people gathered in the club and it showed that there was enthusiasm for the game and opportunities for the young players.

Brian Townsend could not be present but it was fitting that he was at Strathallan School with his son Olly who was attending the under-15 trials for next season.

John McNeill (L) won an outstanding social XI performance award

He reported that there had been great progress in both softball and hardball cricket and that the softball team had done particularly well. The older teams had operated on a joint basis with Uddingston and this had worked particularly well too.

On the night, there were accolades handed out to the club’s junior players and Stenhousemuir welcomed well-known umpire and former Scottish international player, Majid Haq, to present the awards.

All the younger players received a medal and the awards were as follows: Best newcomer, Calum Farquhar; Best softball player, Aaresh Naik; best under-11, Soudhanva Foujadar; best under-13, Lukas Mason while the junior player of the year award went to Olly Townsend. The latter has also just learned that he will help make up Cricket Scotland’s latest Caledonian Highlanders’ regional pathway group.

The club also were able proud to learn that youngster Husnain Atif had been selected for the Scotland under-17s squad.

Husnain Atif (L) was named Stenhousemuir’s most promising junior

There were also awards for the seniors. By tradition these do not include professionals and overseas amateurs but duo Danie Rossouw and Zander Smith were awarded for their outstanding contributions on and off the field of play.

Both had been very successful and would be returning next year and Smith had done great work with young groups from local schools.

Callum Grant, who was part of Scotland’s T10 European Cricket Championship squad back in October, was top wicket taker in the Western Premier Division while the batting trophy went to Adil Raza. The outstanding performance award went to Tippu Sultan for his match winning bowling against Ferguslie.

Top batting in the second XI went to Brian Townsend and bowling was the evergreen Bobby Angus while the award for fielding went to Ryan Reynolds. There were even awards for the social XI and trio Craig Wilson, Bob Bain and John McNeil were honoured.