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Contributors Alex Mummery..............................................................................................................................3 is Tasmanian and exploring cricket feelings.

Tommy Stewart..........................................................................................................................9 is a freelance journalist and podcast producer. He worked on the Tailenders podcast for four years and co-created cult cricket podcast, Murali End. He’s also a proud member of the minute cricketing LGBTQ+ society.

Kim Fulton........................................................................................................................................11 is a writer and cricketer from New Zealand. Her work has appeared in literary journals in New Zealand and overseas. In 2020, she published her first book of poems, I kind of thought the alpacas were a metaphor until we got there. Kim’s played cricket for more than 25 years in regions throughout the country.

Fergal Hanna................................................................................................................................14 is a class warrior, science doer, cat lover, and Stephen Eskinazi fanboy from Northern Derbyshire via Cambridge.

Joe Stephenson........................................................................................................................25 has a dad who taught Ben Stokes for one PE lesson at school and mentions it at every given opportunity. He also has a big thumb and has nothing to promote. He is on Twitter @JoeStephenson96 but does not want you to follow him.

Sean Williams.............................................................................................................................29 In a love triangle with cricket and pale ale. Not the Zimbabwe allrounder. Off-break bowler and lower-middle order (reckless) tee-eroffer. Founder and CEO of Surrey Haters with Memberships. Tom Abell and wide-brim sunhat supremacist.

Benedict Jones..........................................................................................................................33 is a Gloucestershire cricket fan and artist based in Cheltenham.

To check out more of his work head to @benedictthepainter on Instagram.

Billy Pratt.......................................................................................................................................34 says the Hundred is ruining cricket in England, but actually thinks it's done quite good things for the men's game. His favourite cricketer of all time is Tyron Henderson.

Rhiannon is an average not-really-spinner

Abbie is locally flat

Char is Shrektastic

Abi is Jack Leach's number 1 girly

Ildikó

You, Me, and Daisy Three As greater minds than ours have said before us following a period of it being so over: we are so back.

There are some famous faces gracing the pages of our latest issue!

Renowned for his remembering, Joe Stephenson joins the only slightly less famous, but equally handsome, Middlesex white ball captain Stevie Eskinazi.

A big warm welcome to our newest and youngest daisy girls it’s never too early to indoctrinate them into our cricket agenda! We look forward to getting them down the content mines soon for some hard graft.

is your mortal enemy

s Collin a li s e b m y A es boo v Pegg lo . rnie y) (bab han Wa t e r mo

Winnie Mae Collins (3) is a left-arm around and a budding Mankad enthusiast.

“the cricketers’ advice line”

Dear Daisy...

Dear Daisy, I am struggling with my self confidence at the moment and everyone seems to be looking for reasons to replace me in the team. I have a new boss who has just come in and wants me to bat faster than I can go, and although it seems as if everyone else in the team is happy batting like unhinged maniacs at all times, it just isn’t really my speed.

My charismatic ginger friend is coming back from injury and people are looking at me as the person to make way for him, but I’ve made a lot of hard runs when I have played recently and the small boy who took my job while I was sick can’t take catches and stumping’s like me, those two things are my true passion in life. I also started with a new product in my hair, why won’t they notice me?

Yours, B.F

Hi B, I think you have two choices: the first is to keep on quietly doing what you are doing. It seems to me that you are trying your best, and achieving some good results even if its unappreciated by those around, eventually you will get the recognition you deserve.

We all know the soft hands of glove aren’t appreciated like it should be, which is a lament to those of us freaky enough to regularly watch Jack Russell wicketkeeping highlights on YouTube. If you are to take this path, trust that your new boss might remember what its like to be in your shoes and potentially appreciates your passion in life (he might have done a similar job at one point in his life, even?).

Some might even say, that going a bit slower might even balance out your team mates, which is a key to any relationship, taking time

to smell the roses can be immensely rewarding.

The other option, if you can’t beat ‘em join ‘em. It may not feel authentic, and leave you with an emptiness you can’t quite appreciate. Don’t put yourself too far outside of the comfort zone to actually affect your work results - that we don’t want.

However, it might also go a way to stop some of that outside talk and gossip and you might blend into the point where you do get acceptance, but don’t lose sight of yourself, keep that hair long.

- Daisy

Dear Daisy, I spend a lot of time with a boy on my team and I think he might be in love with me. We both love batting and making inside jokes about leaving cricket balls in silly ways. He is a good player and all, and we get on, but it feels like he is trying very hard to be like me, and I don’t think I feel the same way. How can I tell him politely that I don’t want to be with him?

Thanks, S.S

Unfortunately, S, it is possible to be both good at cricket and annoying - in fact many would say that the two might be interlinked.

There will come a time where you might have to tell him that his intensity is too much for you, and that you need space or a different energy in your life. Maybe that also rings a bell to a similar situation you and your team have recently been through too?

- Daisy

Dear Daisy, How do you beat a team that wins 23 matches in a row? asking for a friend.

Sincerely, H.K and H.K

Dear H and also H. A tough question that I don’t think I have an answer to, and maybe not many others do either. What I will say is, all streaks can come to an end, and in sport, the magic is when what was a juggernaut comes unstuck at the hands of team that believes in itself and plays at their full potential, there are few things more emotional, but you know this already. While it might take a longer time to compete with them and beat them regularly - if it is you winning, remember your successes and savour them. It will come though, they’ve lost before and they’ll lose again, like we all will.

- Daisy

Alex Mummery

little jos buttler Jos Buttler is shorter than one would expect. How do I know? Well, *tokes cigarette* I only attempted to interview him after a Hundred game at Old Trafford.

Attempted being the operative word.

Any nerves I had about speaking to the taciturn England captain faceto-face (I’m a podcaster darling, I usually just send a Zoom link to these people’s agents) were quickly consumed by confusion: why is this cricketing Adonis, whose rear I admired so fervently from the 4th row of the party stand during the fourth Ashes Test in 2019, shorter than me?

Look, I can’t pretend I wasn’t delighted, proud even. I’m a white, British male, which makes me entitled to believe I should be at least 6ft, so considering I am as good as that (5ft 11.5 but we round up), it was infeasible to process this information. It was like showing up on a Hinge date with God, who hadn’t lied about his

miracles or innovative creationism, but just… wasn’t who you thought he was.

After the Hundred match, the Lancashire press liaison officer led me and two other journalists down to pitch-side. KP’s there, and leaving his abhorrent views on most things aside, he’s every bit the handsome alpha I’d grown accustomed to idolising in my youth on TV. He actually

superseded my expectations in both his height and aesthetic, but this wasn’t surprising: after working at BBC 5 Live for seven years, you find this is usually the case with sportspeople.

We were asked if we’d be happy to speak to Jos as well as a South African hunk with arguably the best rig in cricket, Faf Du Plessis.

Happy? Pharrell Williams couldn’t express in song form how ecstatic I was - this was my first pitch-side experience in an official capacity and I’m about to ask questions about this silly sport to two of its pillar stones, both international captains.

Experienced sports journalist, Vithushan Ehantharajah, led the charge and me and matey boy from the local paper were happy to follow suit. Faf was fucking fit.

Tall, but not intimidatingly so.

Charming, charismatic, and unconventionally handsome. Boom, first interview’s in the can, and I even snuck some questions in.

Jos is up next and he’s about a slip-cordon’s distance away. My depth perception isn’t the best, but his shoulders and presence suggested he was at least 6ft. Of course, his voice is to the contrary, and as he approached and his stature refused to grow.

That mousy murmur whispered ‘hey guys’ and it dawned on me.

Jos Buttler, the best white ball batter in the world, my favourite player for Lancashire (when he bothers showing up) was… looking up at me. Sure, only at an angle of about 2/3 degrees, but I still felt like bloody behemoth.

What Jos said to us that day is on the record. It’s on the Murali End podcast, and you’ll hear me not ask a fucking question because I spent the majority of the Old Trafford pitch-side encounter processing, and ruminating, my internal monologue screaming ‘ASK HIM WHY HE’S NOT 6 FT 3!’. I was Ryan Gosling on that genius SNL ‘Papyrus sketch’ (I’m not gonna explain it to you, go on YouTube now if you’ve not already seen it).

Lesson is, never meet your heroes… unless their name is Faf Du Plessis.

Tommy Stewart

A A p o e t ’ s p o e t ’ s g u i d e g u i d e t o t h e t o t h e n e w n e w c o d e c o d e

On the first day of October 2022 the blue book I carry at the bottom of my gear bag became obsolete once again.

Change is the law of life. Luckily, cricketers are nothing if not adaptable. From cloud cover to the colour of the pitch, we are used to making our external circumstances work for us. Cricket, like all sports, is an arbitrary set of rules, no more or less than the laws that govern it.

There’s beauty in that. Confusion at times too. So here are the most significant changes that came into force in October, in the seventeen-syllable Haiku format.

Moving the running out of the non-striker The same as before.

The code just removes any crisis of conscience.

Dead ball Stray dogs and streakers.

The random acts of others don’t alter fates here.

Judging a wide A batter’s movement is consequential before the bowler’s last stride.

Batters returning when caught New batter takes guard where the last one departed.

Ashes to ashes.

Kim Fulton

No Saliva Covid changed the world but spit never really helped with swing anyway.

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A TALE OF TWO BATTERS

Here are some batting statistics for two Test cricketers in the summer of 2022. 13 innings, 7 matches, same conditions.

CRICKETER #1

CRICKETER #2

RUNS: 327 AVERAGE: 25.15 S/R: 55.23 50s: 2 TOP SCORE: 67 DUCKS: 0

RUNS: 276 AVERAGE: 23.00 S/R: 57.26 50s: 2 TOP SCORE: 69* DUCKS: 0

CAREER AVERAGE: 23.84 (10 MATCHES) .

CAREER AVERAGE: 27.26 (28 MATCHES)

Now, imagine you’ve got to pick a squad for winter tours. You’re off to Pakistan and New Zealand, both places capable of producing flat tracks that are a lot easier to bat on than green English wickets. Both perfect places for batters to get some runs and confidence, where scoring quickly may be needed to force a result.

Do you pick one, both, or neither of the batters above? ___________

Cricketers #1 and #2 are respectively, if you haven’t guessed by now, Alex Lees and Zak Crawley– the incumbent England openers at the end of the 2022 summer. Looking at their statistics, they had basically the same summer and, whilst Crawley had the better average in his career overall, he had been given a much longer rope over his international career. Into the ___

winter, that trend only continued, with Crawley keeping his spot in England’s top order and Lees unceremoniously dropped.

Even after putting aside the fact that Rob Key, England Men’s Director of Cricket, was a mentor to Crawley at Kent, there is an obvious disparity between him and Lees: their backgrounds.

Zak Crawley went to Tonbridge School, which boasts over £11.5k a term in fees. His dad, known as ‘Terry the Till’, made the Sunday Times Rich List as a trader in the City.

Alex Lees went to Holy Trinity Senior School (now Trinity Academy) in Halifax, his dad getting him into cricket through local clubs. In fact, Lees’ school was academised when he was 17 due to poor performance in inspections, so one can only guess that it was not offering a similar level of education to a fee-paying school.

Crawley’s school was also Ed Smith’s – who was National Selector when Crawley debuted – alma mater. Smith was also Selector for Sam Billings’ debut, a fellow Kent player who jumped to Crawley’s defence on Twitter when people suggested that his background could be helping his __

cricket career progress.

A lot of pieces have been written about how cricket has been made the pursuit of private schools and not state schools: the selling off of land, the time and expenses required. However, what is maybe not discussed as much is that simply having your face ‘fit’ is equally as beneficial to your career as the private education that shaped it. Would Crawley have benefitted as much if he didn’t have association through his upbringing with a former England National Selector and the Current Director of Cricket?

8 of the 15 England Men’s squad picked for the NZ tests went to private schools, over 50%, compared to 7% of the country.

The current England men’s National Selector and Director of Cricket both attended private schools at one point or another during their education. It’s the culture and the norm in elite cricket in England.

Cricket in England has a deepseated and worsening issue with class, one which requires a twofold solution. Money needs to be spent at the bottom of the game to make it so every single child has equal access and opportunity to cricket.

Ildikó met with Middlesex's 3rd slowest runner (and the only pro cricketer with Official Daisy Girl Status), Stevie Eskinazi.

“That makes total sense and I have some strong views on it!!”

Several days after meeting up with Stevie Eskinazi at Lord’s to talk cricket for a couple of hours, I sent him some extra questions and got the ideal response. As a fan, it’s very rare to feel like you know what a player thinks about almost anything. Given cricket’s track record on outspoken players, you might think to yourself that’s not such a bad thing - maybe it’s best not to know - but fortunately for us Stevie is not just happy to share his opinions on topics that we care about, but is also, in my very professional opinion, sound as hell.

“I probably represent the bogstandard county cricket player. It would be cool for people to know we’re interested in more than just ourselves and cricket. And for people who are thinking that everyone in the inner sanctum of the game is just happy with having their own group of people,very similar to themselves, to know that it’s particularly not the attitude of the players. I know the people that I play with, and the club, and that’s actually everything that we don’t want to be.”

It’s apparent that Stevie sincerely wants to make a difference at

Middlesex and beyond.

He volunteered himself for the club’s Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion committee last year, and sees players as having a pivotal role in influencing the approach to change: “As professional players we are at the forefront of people’s minds, we have a certain following

and I think we have a certain obligation to show that, not only is cricket somewhere people can go and feel safe and enjoy themselves, but there’s a clear pathway for anybody who desires to take their game to the next level and push to make it their job and that they feel like they will be valued for their ability. That comes from the way we treat people, but alsofrom how we act in interviews and the words and language we use to show that we are part of the solution. We have an opportunity as young people to get on the front foot, and I just think: “why the fuck not?””

His home ground of Lord’s is a particularly alienating venue, the kind local young people might come to for a match and think “this isn’t the place for me”. The demographic makeup of the team or the crowds don’t correspond to that of the area that Middlesex is supposed to represent, wherethe team visit local schools to introduce kids to cricket.

“I think class is probably the most significant barrier to participation. It’s an expensive sport to take up, there are high barriers to entry whether that be club costs, equipment costs, even making nets or making a cricket pitch. It’s also giving up a minimum of five or six hours, which a lot of families don’t have. It’s a lot of

time and money to pursue a sport where you may not feel you fit in we have a real responsibility to make it worth it. You can’t just pick up a cricket ball and go and play, and that’s something that’s really disappointing."

“The game in general needs to be willing to listen to the stories of people who have felt undervalued.”

Middlesex are making efforts to improve their community outreach, but some logistical barriers are difficult: in the builtup inner city, schools can’t pop to a local cricket club to use the facilities and kit for a PE lesson, and there’s little space in which to play even if the interest is there.Talent, enthusiasm and the willingness to work hard all count for a lot, but for a working-class Londoner you’ve fallen behind before you’ve even looked at a cricket ball. It’s no surprise that talented kids end up choosing to pursue sports like football instead - kits are cheap, and it can be practised almost anywhere.

✿✿✿✿✿ Stevie sees changing dressing room culture as a key part of improving inclusion, and his responsibility as a senior player.

It’s a more nuanced task than a wholesale elimination of “banter” (say the word three times in the mirror and Justin Langer appears with a pack of Uno cards). In a sport that’s still dominated by white, privately-educated men, many of whom don’t have a world of experience with people different from themselves, real empathy is key - not just knowing where the line is, but understanding why that’s where it is.

“We need to understand how some people might find some things uncomfortable and be critically aware of that, rather than just saying “ah well, what happens in a dressing room stays in a dressing room”. I really hope that I can help leave behind a feeling that anyone can walk in at any given time and feel comfortable, and nobody’s going to be worried about how certain people might treat them. I hope that if I were to say something that wasn’t respectful I would be pulled up on it, and the same for others.

“When people aren’t sure how to

treat someone who is different from them in some way, I say have the weird conversation up front ask people “how do you want to be treated, what are you up for, what do you not want to be part of” and then go from there.

People will shy away from it because it’s awkward, and it means addressing the difference head on, but if you don’t do it then you’re just going to be weird all the time, and that’s what makes people feel excluded.

“The game in general needs to be willing to listen to the stories of people who have felt undervalued.

Then you can ask the right questions and hopefully then be a little more targeted in the way that you try to help. As players and professional teams, you do as much as you possibly can to make sure that there’s a really broad level of understanding of every background, of every person’s situation, so that if somebody were to enter your dressing room, you could be really understanding and value them as an equal, which i think is all that anyone really wants coming in.”

This attitude carries through to the cricket pitch, and he prefers English cricket over the “oldschool, bullish and brash” Australian version for this reason:

“The players aren’t, they are amazing people, but the whole culture of Australian cricket is still stuck a little bit in the 90s.

They think making people uncomfortable is the way they need to win, and boys, it just isn’t that way anymore. No-one’s scared of that attitude, it never makes the other guy play worse.

In England it feels like it’s just not a thing anymore - or we play so much against each other that everyone’s really friendly, on the county circuit especially. Doesn’t mean you’re not competitive, doesn’t mean you’re not trying to get them out or beat them, but you don’t have to be a dick to them anymore.”

✿✿✿✿✿ Having been overlooked in the 2021 and 2022 drafts for The Hundred, Stevie’s time has come this year, being picked up to join the freshly-revamped Welsh Hula Hoops team after watching London Spirit from the wings at Lord’s for two years: “I’m so excited because it is designed to be super accessible, to grow the women’s game, to make people want to come and watch cricket who never felt like they could before. And it looks so much fun. We [Middlesex] played 50 over cricket at the time, with

maybe 200 fans at an out ground, which can be romantic if it’s a nice day, but then you come back here in the evening, watch the game and think ‘that looks really fun, and these guys are here with a big crowd, in a colourful kit, with a cool DJ." We talk about how franchise cricket has been fundamentally disruptive not only on a structural level but on an ideological one, allowing players to assert themselves as workers and challenge traditional ideas about loyalty: “While we like to think of cricket as this romantic industry where loyalty is really high and people play for pride, for their county or their country … what can sometimes get lost is that there are families who depend on us, and you’re trying to create a sense of security for you and your family. If you speak to anyone in “normal jobs” and said you can work for 40% less time and earn three times as much money, it’s a no-brainer, but when it comes to cricket, people say “you can’t not play for Surrey or Sussex and go and play in the IPL, it’s not what you do” - and it’s like, would you like someone to turn down £200K that when they’ve finished their already short career is going to help stabilise their future and

their family?”

Recent events have highlighted a shift in power dynamics in cricket with the opportunities provided by franchise teams. Dane van Niekerk was controversially dropped from the South Africa Women’s World Cup team due to failing a portion of the fitness test, despite being arguably their most valuable player. She spoke about how she was confused and alienated by the decision, that she didn’t feel valued by Cricket South Africa anymore. Weeks later, she retired from international cricket.

“We like to think of cricket as this romantic industry … what can sometimes get lost is that there are families who depend on us.” __ With places in Royal Challengers Bangalore and Oval Invincibles’ squads, van Niekerk can continue to make her living playing cricket, and through that hopes to find her love for the sport again. These

opportunities surely made it easier to quit the South Africa team - something that would have been much harder for (particularly female) cricketers just a few years ago. They undeniably afford players at that level a greater freedom of choice in their careers, and a bargaining chip if they are unhappy with their treatment.

No matter how much people argue about it, the landscape of cricket is permanently changing, and counties and the ECB face the challenge of changing along with it to retain players - and it might not be a battle they can win: “The first thing is: it’s really the responsibility of the game and teams to create an environment that people love to play in, feel challenged and want to be there.

The second thing is unfortunately, we don’t like to say it - money. Salaries have to stay competitive in the market because fundamentally it’s a job, a short-term one that people can now make really strong livings from. If it’s going to effectively cost you earnings to go and play for England for a long period of time, it’s probably going to be something people do less and less.

Franchise cricket allows you to develop your game, to go and travel the world, to make lots of

money…I don’t see anything about those things that isn’t going to drag a whole heap of players to go and want to be a part of them.”

The theme that keeps coming up is money. When we talk about lack of diversity in cricket, when we talk about the class divide, money is front and centre - whether that’s the cost of playing, the cost of attending, or the competitiveness of players’ salaries. Anyone who is serious about improving diversity in the game needs to know that they’re trying to bring in more people for whom money is a constant concern in life, rather than a constant presence. We feel confident in saying that Stevie gets it - and we’re glad to know he’s there behind the scenes trying to affect change.

“I’ve been very lucky, so I would love for more people to feel the way I have. If the team did well that’d be a nice thing for people to remember you by, it would also be nice to leave the game knowing that diversity at Middlesex is in a better place than when I started.”

We’re looking forward to seeing what Stevie achieves both on and off the pitch. Regardless, he’s a Daisy Girl for life.

Read the full version of Ildikó's chat with Stevie on the zine blog!

QUICK-FIRE

Q&A Who is the best you batter reckon you could bowl out?

“Mark Stoneman, he’s left handed and I like bowling off spin [pretty bold choice here Stevie].”

“Best - salt and vinegar Worst - bbq beef.”

WI

TH S ESK TEVIE INA ZI

Name another cricketer with “Max Holden - a Daisy energy... pretty boy on

Worst player to face in the nets?

As a brand new Welsh Hula Hoop player, what are the best and worst Hula Hoop flavours?

“Tom Helm - he’s 6’6”, constantly bowls no balls, always has a brand new ball, and has a tendency to take out his frustrations on you if you’re his housemate and you’ve been leaving dirty mugs around the place.”

Who is your first pick on MarioKart?

“Donkey Kong - is that the right gorilla? Yeah Donkey Kong I think.”

What’s your goto karaoke song?

[Answered without a second’s thought] “Angels - Robbie Williams.”

the surface but very sharp underneath.”

Favourite of way cooking eggs?

“I learned to poach eggs properly during lockdown, and it really impresses people who can’t do it” [as someone who can’t poach eggs, this is correct].

NOBLE CRICKET MASCOTS true A fixture on any . ce a R t o sc a st M The Vitality Bla ash of titans, 18 cl A r. a nd le ca orting cricket fan’s sp torious. y one can be vic nl o , rt a st ts o masc But is this a true test of the mettle of a mascot? I would argue, no. The true test of a mascot is how noble they are.

Can a mascot stand toe to toe with a proper bin man, an odds and sods man, or a lollipop lady and hold their head up high? In this essay I will answer this question once and for all.

According to noted weights and measurements website of record “weight of stuff’, the combined 600lb might of Carmen Bear (it’s a cheese pun) and Hugh Bear (it’s not a cheese pun), the bears from Birmingham Bears, is equal to that of a baby grand piano, a fully stocked vending machine, or two fairly small brown bears.

According to the Cricketers Trust Finals Day mascot Twitter thread, (The Bible for mascot-related stats) as being into amateur dramatics and karaoke- two things I’m sure we can all agree are basically just showing off. That being said, large things generally are quite noble, with the exception, of course, of Richard Osman, and therefore we will start with a nobility score of 7/10- a solid start for two solid mascotsalbeit ones you wouldn’t want to spend more than 10 minutes with at a party. Caesar of Surrey fame is another bear (editor’s note: Caesar is a lion, we don’t know where he got this from), but without a cheese themed pun for a name;

he cannot be given a score of more than 2/10.

The average T20 cricket match lasts around 3 hours, meaning that Freddie The Falcon, a 13 year old Falcon, is in breach of child labour laws every time he steps on to the field. Children did make excellent chimney sweeps, this is a fact, but it is 2023 and various factors outside of my control mean that this is no longer deemed acceptable. Nobility scoreexempt. Hawky the Hampshire Hawk also sadly meets this same fate, as a 2 year-old cruelly taken from his mother’s nest and forced to entertain cricket fans; as does Nile The Crocodile from Worcester Rapids, who is only 8.

Eagles can be majestic and golden, but they can also be bald. Does this limit their nobility score? Yes. Essex’s mascots are called Ellie The Eagle and Eddie The Eagle, which as well as being uninspiring, also infringes on a number of copyrights now owned by 20th Century Fox. 2/10. The only true noble dragon for me is the late, great and sorely missed Hilary Devey, and with that in mind Morgan the Dragon from Glamorgan, can .

only be described as incredibly ignoble- although the statistics say that Morgan is 1000 years old, which I’m sure we can all agree is commendable. 3/10.

Somerset’s Stumpy The Dragon, not to be confused with Stumpy - one half of the mascot team of Willow and Stumpy on Cricket AM (whoooooooo remembers) - is another cricketing dragon mascot, but loses a nobility point for not even wearing a cricket shirt - sort it out mate.

2/10.

Men in dungarees, questionable facial hair, Idles. Mention Bristol and the word ‘noble’ does not instantly spring to mind. One man, however, is trying to change that: enter, Alfred The Gorilla.

Standing at an astonishing 7ft4, this guy is wasted as a cricket mascot, but stick at it and I’m sure one day the phone call will come from the big man brother, Mr Vincent Kennedy McMahon.

Until he gets a deserved run in the WWE, Alfred scores a very solid 8/10 for nobility, based almost entirely on the fact that despite being 92 he could batter every single other mascot- with the exception perhaps of Yorkshire’s ‘Vinny The Viking’- a main event fight .

that could grace any wrestling ring across the world. Vinny is clearly noble, but loses points for being from Yorkshire 6.5/10.

Another vertically-gifted mascot is Charlie The Fox, who stands at an impressive 7ft tall.

The nobility of foxes can be argued long into the night, but this fox explicitly names his sporting hero as David Gower which, as a 19 year old fox, is loser behaviour. 4/10 Kent used to have a Spitfire as their mascot, perhaps the most noble death machine ever created. Now they are a pale imitation of themselves with two frankly pathetic horse mascots named Victa and Victoria. I cannot even dignify these two lowlifes with a rating. The same goes for Sandy and Sid the Shark. Both of these mascots look insane, and serious animal welfare issues must be raised for Sussex County Cricket Club keeping these creatures on dry land.

Lanky The Giraffe walks around like he owns the place, and he would be correct in his thinking.

Undoubtedly the top dog of the mascot world. But are giraffes .

noble? Kurt Angle won an Olympic Gold Medal with a broken neck, if that same fate happened to a giraffe it would almost certainly be forced to cross over the rainbow bridge.

Obvious cervical spine issues notwithstanding, you cannot argue that Lanky is not a great servant to the sport of cricket.

7/10 Steeler, of Northants Steelbacks fame, is a 144 year old dog which, in dog years, is very very old. He also allegedly fought in a war. 4/10.

Grey squirrels are generally (and rightly) considered vermin.

Thank God then, that beloved Nottinghamshire mascot Nuts The Squirrel is a noble red squirrel. The anti-nut culture in this country is why we now have a Twix in a tin of Celebrations rather than the humble Topic. With this in mind we have to stick by our wonderful red squirrels: 7.5/10.

The naysayers (I do not mean horses, as mentioned before I have nothing but disgust for Victa and Victoria from Kent) would perhaps say that it is impossible to write over a thousand words on a subject as arbitrary as mascots in a sport .

you haven’t really watched since you were 14 years old. What I would say to them is, you have not met a man with as much free time as me. In conclusion, many of the mascots can proudly look in the mirror and say that – yes, I am a noble being. Many cannot.

Cricket’s main challenge in future will be to try and bridge this gap. Bring back the Spitfire for Kent, replace the Hampshire Hawk with an ice cream man who sells single cigarettes on the side, and ditch Freddie the Falcon in favour of something the young fans of Derbyshire can really look up to- a man in a costume pretending to be a steeplejack.

Editor’s note: Chester and River the lion the panther w s and Pinky ere omitted fr o m th is author’s path piece due to th ological hatre e d o f b ig cats. We can apologise to th only e counties of D urham and Mid dlesex.

Joe Stephenson

LUV CRICKET, The home countiest of all the home counties, Surrey is famous for its gorgeous country homes, rolling hills, and capacity to contain all the nation’s worst bellends in one convenient location. Their cricket club, aptly, is so flush with cash that they can’t go a week without making a signing, and every evening during Blast season Ralph Lauren and gilet clad bussinesspeople flock from the city to Kennington to babble incoherently through 6-12 pints whilst cricket happens in the background.

So Surrey is terrible, and the cricket club is terrible. So what?

Well, because they’ve got all the money, they also have all the jobs.

Cricket fans from the north, east, south and west move to London in search of better lives, often exiling themselves from their local clubs. There are options to scratch the leather-on-willow itch. One is Middlesex, playing at the home of cricket will cost you £20 per day of county championship cricket if you haven't got *checks notes* 29 years to wait for an MCC membership. The other is… well, Surrey.

‘ATE SURREY Despite all the terrible people, places, organisations and I’m sure even animals that find themselves in Surrey, the cricket club actually has a lot going for it. The Oval is a lovely ground, accessible and pretty, despite some of its clientele. The cost of membership is pretty cheap, especially as a young’un (cheeky price hikes for 26-year-olds notwithstanding), and you get a lot of bang for that buck. As a result, those exiled fans, stuck between a rock and a posh place, traipse to Kennington in their dozens to get their fix of this silly, silly game, and to cheer on whomever is playing against the team in maroon that given day.

But no longer does this experience need to be dour introducing Surrey Haters With Memberships! Banding together under the flag of hatred, fans of all 17 other counties can cheer on the opposition in one proud voice.

A voice that will not bend the knee to the cash-splashing, commutertown-having, 85k-a-year-isn’tactually-a-lot-after-tax-thinking outfit. We look forward to you joining us, admission is free.

Sean Williams

?

WHO IS THIS

email your guesses to daisycutterzine@gmail.com because we had absolutely no idea

CRICKET DAVE ENTERS THE MULTIVERSE Well, thanks to the

This is wonderful! I am delighted for the players who worked so hard for this.

tireless work of the MCC members…

Cricket is safe from the marxists for another year…Eton shall play Harrow after all.

Tradition iz important.

I grow weary of the fight…yes we have staved off the slings and arrows of wokery for now, but a day will come when the courage of men fails, when we forsake our friends and the toilets at Lord’s are made gender neutral…and I fear we will fail to SAVE CRICKET…I wish for respite from this cruel world, I wish I could travel to a better one, where I can simply enjoy this game which I hate.

Why aren’t you happy Cricket Dave?

Cricket Dave…are you familiar with multiverse theory?

Reality is not limited to the constraints of the observed universe, but instead one of many quantum realities scattered across infinite parallel universes with every possible outcome of every possible combination of events exists. What if I told you I have a device for travelling the multiverse?

We made it! A universe where Eton vs Harrow is the biggest game!

We can go to a universe where Eton vs Harrow is the biggest cricket match of the season…

Wait…

In this universe…ETON IS A GIRL’S SCHOOL!!!!!

CRICKET DAVE WILL RETURN (?)

Cover art by Char Purdham