The Meon Valley Marauders Cricket Club (MVMCC) was founded in 2001 when Tom Marien challenged me to a cricket match. We were in The Pub with No Name, or perhaps Oscars (a classic sticky-floor nightclub in Petersfield), or possibly the legendary Conservative Club (a long-defunct private gentlemen’s club in Alton)—no one can say for sure.

The first match was at Elsted CC, and was won by MVMCC (though recollections may vary.) What can be said with absolute confidence is that we had a maraudingly good time in the Three Horseshoes post-match.

This pattern broadly continued with an annual match until 2006, when my lovely girlfriend and I flew to New Zealand for what I innocently imagined would be a one-month expedition to get married. My wife, however, had other ideas, and we ended up staying in NZ for 10 epic years.

MVMCC played two games in the land of the long white cloud - the results have been lost in the mists of time, but I’m confident that victory was ours. Unfortunately cricket in NZ, while certainly played in the correct bibulous spirit, lacked the requisite moist, damp, green wickets of the Meon Valley upon which the gentlemen of MVMCC can express our true colours.

So, in 2016 my family and I moved back to the UK with the express goal of restoring MVMCC to its right and proper home upon the verdantly-verdurous wickets of the Meon Valley. And perhaps most importantly, to return to battle against our greatest foe, in our annual grudge match against Tom Marien CC.

The first match was at East Meon CC, and though I am very tempted to lie and tell you MVMCC was triumphant, the fact of the matter is that we lost—a very worrying start to our return to the competitive-crucible-of-cricket, that is the Meon Valley. Happily we managed to forget the result during the post-match marauding.

Sadly, our run of form continued for three years of agonisingly painful defeats to Tom Marien CC. The human race then went through one of its occasional collective outbreaks of insanity and decided to imprison itself in order to try and avoid a bit of a sniffle. Post-lockdown, we decided that a change of venue might break our losing streak, so we decamped to Hambledon CC in 2022, no such luck; we were thrashed again, we drowned our sorrows in the Bakers Arms.

But, dear reader, the worm had turned, little did we know that sunlit uplands were just over the horizon ... Tom Marien, no less, proposed that we play at his home ground of Hawkley CC in 2023. Perhaps they were overcome with nerves at playing in front of their home crowd, possibly the goddess Fortuna intervened, or alternatively, it might have been my recruitment of two young tyro ringers. We won, what sweet relief, and how delicious the ale tasted.

Roll on summer,

Jack Martin