Oswestry are looking forward to 2024 as their first team aim to improve on their 2023 position of fifth in the Shropshire County Cricket League Premier division.

The returning Alex Huxley takes over as captain from Robbie Clarke and the Shropshire county player brings a firm hand to the tiller over the coming months. 

Huxley is joined by the return of Mark Robinson, a former club captain himself who also can claim Shropshire experience, and Ian Davies who has played over 300 times for Oswestry and taken 403 wickets.

Oswestry have further strengthened by signing Matty Richards from Sentinel, talented allrounder Thavisha Ranasinghe, and an overseas player, Shakkae Marshall who has represented Barbados at junior level and is an exciting top order batter who also bowls off spin. 

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Joe Monk will also be starting his second season with the club, having taken 5-37 against this weekend’s opponents St Georges last season.

All this experience is in place to supplement the burgeoning homegrown youth talent of Josh Darley, Josh Coleridge, Keenan Oakley, Archie James and Henry Walker.

The thriving junior section has provided many members of the for the club’s four senior team and this year Oswestry have re-joined the midweek league with their Aardvarks CC team.

The Stonehouse Oval will host the Shropshire CCC T20 double header against Herefordshire CCC on Sunday, May 5th.

Frankton will be led by Tom Welti after Grant McKay stepped down following this summer’s promotion.

Seamer Oli Sharp joins from Richmond Nomads and spinner Frank Lloyd arrives from Knockin while batsman Ryan Kruger returns for a second season.

Vice captain Lloyd Phillips said: “It’ll be a tough challenge back in the Premier league but the lads are well prepared and we’ve made a decision to pull out white ball evening league side in order to focus on the weekend SCCL to include more training and better focus. 

“One thing we have at Frankton is the squad are genuine mates off the field and this stands in good stead.”

Chirk are looking forward to the start of the Shropshire League season - and, once more, match highlights will be available to view on YouTube!

Getting footage of matches was the brainchild of skipper Luke Gardner and after starting the initiative last year, it's lights, camera, action once more for 2024, starting with tomorrow's Division One trip to Wroxeter.

"The reason I started it was Andrew Swarbrick and Gareth Partridge got about 150 each and I missed that day," said Gardner.

"The hope this year is to record the footage on Saturday, put it together Saturday night and include the stats to the end. The aim is to get it on Sunday evening."

Gardner will be hoping his first highlights package will contain a Chirk victory.

He added: "We're optimistic. Last season, we came into this fixture kind of in a good place and they ended up beating us quite comprehensively.

"There was one lad there taking wickets for fun.

"I'm full of optimism, but we don't want to go there thinking we're going to win the game.

"There's been a lot of movement of players this year in the Shropshire League.

"There's been a couple of teams that have got in some some good players and some of the teams down from the Premier Division have got some solid teams.

"This year, I don't think there's a team there you can say they're going to struggle this season."

Chirk will have Andrew Swarbrick and Wynn Jones available for most of the season, but the duo are missing for this weekend.

Ellesmere will also continue in division one.

Meanwhile Knockin and Kinnerley will compete in division two with captain Rhys Williams targeting promotion.

South African all rounder called Derick Bester joins while JP Erasmus returns to soften the blow of Frank Lloyd’s exit.

Oswestry IIs compete in division three and Frankton IIs in division four while Knockin IIs join Cae Glas in division six.

Cae Glas IIs, Chirk IIs and Ellesmere IIs compete in division seven.