THE first women’s and girls’ cricket teams at Ramsbottom Cricket Club have proved their worth winning championships, a league and a T20, despite it being a tricky year.
The 175-year-old cricket club had been running an All Stars programme for 5-8 year olds, but decided to launch its own female teams in February this year.
Haslingden High School student Neve Harris, 15, has been playing cricket for nearly six years and plays in the U15s girls team at Ramsbottom as well as for both of the senior teams.
She said: “We were playing for Brooksbottom, but decided to switch to Ramsbottom when they introduced an U13, U15 girls and two senior teams.
“The U13s won the County Championships, as did the U15s; we played Urmston in the final and won by 65 runs.
“The Super 8s seniors’ team I play with won their league and in the T20, the other senior team at Ramsbottom that I play for, bowled Burnley out with 13 runs to spare and I got the last wicket.”
Neve said the results were even more amazing because the teams had not been able to train very often because of COVID restrictions.
She said: “We have had a really long off season with only a quarter of the matches being played and often we have not been able to train so no practices beforehand.”
Neve said the teams would be back practising in the nets over winter and she is looking forward to next year’s season which will begin in the summer.