There is a buzz around the Riding Mill Cricket Club at the moment as they prepare to board the virtual plane Down Under for what should be a memorable month of Dice Cricket fixtures beginning early Sunday morning.

Normally the club that was originally founded in 1880 and is based in the beautiful village of Riding Mill in the Tyne Valley would be competing in the Northumberland & Tyneside Cricket League but due to COVID-19 they have had to seek out other options.

Brian Watson from the club got the lads organised to play in a dice cricket tournament organised by Dice Sport and he says it has proven to be a big hit with the club.

“With regards this season due to COVID-19 we’ve had to look for other things to do due to lack of cricket, I stumbled upon a dice cricket tournament being organised by @DiceSport on twitter and thought it would be fun to enter the club. I also thought it would also be a good idea to get the players to donate to our fundraising Just Giving page whilst at the same time having a bit of fun. We are fundraising for a new practice strip and an Electronic Scoreboard. https://justgiving.com/crowdfunding/brian-watson?utm_term=dGA2dXZ92… All the players have taken it on board and got involved, and that’s how our love affair with #dicecricket started.”

It was so popular in fact that Brian was keen to keep things rolling and when this was not possible locally, he put his feelers out on social media. Much to his delight, he was able to plant the seed of a virtual tour with host of the Cricket Library Podcast, Matt Ellis

“In Australia i found a fellow dice cricket nut Matt Ellis and after a few questions the idea of a Dice Cricket tour was born. I helped Matt contact a few clubs via Twitter and he has kindly done the rest”

With the home tournament now concluded, Riding Mill have a practice match scheduled on Thursday against neighbouring club Mallards. There are some players who will be using this game as an opportunity to have one last tune up before the action begins with a highly anticipated clash with the Cricket Library Podcast Invitational XI.

The Cricket Library Podcast XI have already announced network seven journalist and #CricketCountdown patron Nina Stevens in their line up as well as former Adelaide Strikers & Melbourne Renegades wicketkeeper batsman Tim Ludeman.

We are also hearing whispers out of the Cricket Library that there will be one final marque player announced in the lead up to the tour opener on Sunday morning.