The 2008 season saw Rayleigh with four teams playing league cricket with the First team in Division 2, the Second team in Division 5, the Third team in Division 9. The IV\’s had been accepted into a newly created 8 team Division 11 of the T-Rippon league. The playing results were mixed but more of that later.

April

Not a great start to the season with only one friendly match producing a win.

May

The First team won 3 games and Second team lost all of theirs. The Third team started the league season unbeaten with the highlight being a high scoring game at Aythorpe Roding with John Stirk scoring a rapid 103 and the marathon game finally ending at 8:30pm!

Jon Cook scored 99 vs Great Waltham — so near to the first ton of the season. Unbeaten 55 by IB saw the firsts win by 2 wkts on the 24th vs Gt Burstead. Otherwise — no outstanding batting for the 1sts.

Weather ruined 11 matches during May and the 4th team had their 1st ever league match cancelled and this ended up being the difference between 2nd and 3rd in Div 11.

June

June was a poor month in general with only 8 victories from 22 matches that were started. The First team only won 1 game with a 2 wicket win at Great Baddow. Other teams fared only slightly better and the Fourth team finally kicked off their league campaign against Fairview and lost. Perhaps the highlight of the month was a tied game for the Fourth team against Wickham with a tenth wicket partnership of 20 being ended with a keepers catch and scores level on 183.

July

The First team continued with mixed results as did the Third team. The Second team failed to win at all during the month but finally reached 200 in an innings against Woodham Mortimer but still lost by 4 wickets. But it was left to the Fourth team to lead the way with wins in all four of their games during the month to climb the table after the season had started with two rained off games.

A 6th wicket partnership of 111 between S Adams and C Baird saw the Firsts defend 203 against Canvey.

John Cook scored 104 vs Bentley II\’s — won by 26 runs

August

Tour — won 2 — lost 1

During the tour a few teddies were thrown out of various prams but the matches themselves were redeemed by some elegant batting by Jon Cook and especially Marcus Cornish, who found that the Isle of Wight suited his batting style. (Can we move one of their pitches to Essex to help him next season?).

The Fourth team recorded a large 109 run win over Wickham but lost again to Fairview

Immediately after coming back from the tour the final league games took place on the 30th August and the Second team won a high scoring game by just 4 runs to retain their place in Division 5. The Fourth teams season ended with a low scoring 18 run defeat against Stock III\’s which meant that Stock finished second and we were left to wait for the juggling of teams at the end of the season.

The final team placings were

* First team were 5th in Division 2
* Second team were 8th in Division 5
* Third team were 3rd in Division 9
* Fourth team ended 3rd in Division 11

The Fifth team played friendlies throughout the season and won a match each month but had to play against some very strong opposition.

September

Highlight of the month was on the 13th when all 4 teams won. The First team won a low scoring game at Herongate scoring only 124 and still winning by 8 runs with IB top scoring with 39.

The 4th team game at Eastwood featured two father and son pairings (Verrinder, Richard & Sam and Grob, Chris and Sean) with RV & Richard Dawbarn putting on 148 for the 2nd wicket only for RD to be retired on 115* by the skipper to allow younger batsmen a chance. (Note for Willie — RD would have eclipsed your batting cup score without the enforced retirement!)

Sunday team — won 3, drew 1 in September