Cricket On Ice

Once again, the OCs were invited to participate in the annual Cricket on Ice tournament which takes place early February on the frozen lake of St Moritz, high up in the Swiss alps. The OCs brought one of their strongest teams hoping to go one better than they did in 2023 when they were beaten in the final. This year there were teams from Australia, Germany, Estonia, Switzerland and UK taking part.  

For their 3 group matches, OC skipper John Zani (WG 1966) passed the captaincy to Jamie Whybrow (GH 2003), Ross McCaskill (FG 1993) and Eddie Tse (SG 2013) and each led their side to victory. There were excellent individual performances by `debutant` Aroop Bhattacharya (KG 2012) with the ball, and C on I `veteran` Jules Schlagman (SH 2003) with both bat and ball! Jamie captained the side in the final against the favourites from Estonia (who included a number of Aussie-based cricketers- and who are hoping to have former test player Brett Lee among their ranks next year). 

Having got off to an excellent start (batting first) with Jules and Jamie again excelling, there was an unexpected mid innings collapse which meant that the total of 104 off the allocated 15 overs was going to be difficult to protect. Indeed, the Estonian side had some big hitters who showed their strength and although the OCs fought all the way, they lost by with just one over to spare. A brilliant tournament much enjoyed by all and here is hoping that the OCs will be invited back next year and to win it!