England Rugby World Cup Squad, August 2019

By shendyNo Comments
Prior to the 2019 Rugby World Cup, the England squad were training at Clifton Rugby Club, and the sponsors O2 laid on a "meet the squad" event. Happily, this took place round the corner from my office so I booked an afternoon off work and went. After an interminable wait, (most of) the players eventually arrived and generally mingled, posed for photos and signed autographs.There were also some interviews - Joe Marler is very funny, although I think he had to keep reminding himself to keep the content and language suitable for all ages... As a Northampton Saints fan I was of course on the lookout for our players - Piers Francis wasn't around, I didn't get to meet Courtney Lawes (he was called off to do a "grip & grin") but I did manage to see Lewis Ludlam and wish him luck....
Read More

Archery

By shendyNo Comments
Back in January I took up archery - it's something I've quietly fancied for a few years (see below) and I finally got round to doing something about it when a leaflet dropped through the door over Christmas.I'd only tried it a couple of time before - once on a Warner Holidays break on the Isle of Wight back in 1994 (see the first photo in the gallery below) and then at Nudefest in Cornwall in 2013. So yes, a lot of my previous experience at archery was in the buff - and I am duty-bound to point out that I won the competition at Nudefest - I even have a trophy and can therefore claim to be Best Naked Archer in Britain 2013! I do have photos of that too, but well, no. Chatting with the club organisers at North Bristol Archery, I offered to take some photos for their website, so last week I went along with my bow...
Read More

First Cricket Shots

By shendyNo Comments
Back in the 1980s I spent entire summers at the County Ground in Northampton watching cricket, and in 1986 I started taking a few photos - eventually leading to the hobby I have now. These are my first cricket photos, taken with my dad's compact camera - I didn't move on to action photos until I got my first SLR in 1987 and borrowed his 300mm lens. There are some big names, so not a bad start - legendary West Indies stars Clive Lloyd, Joel Garner and Viv Richards, as well as a certain Ian Botham. The Garner/Richards/Botham shots were taken at Northants' annual trip to play at Wellingborough School. In the Sunday League match, Botham (just back from a ban after he admitted smoking marijuana) hit 175no including 12 4's and 13 6's - remember that these were 40 over matches, and he only batted for 27 of them! OK, the ground was very small, but it was probably the most amazing innings I saw.  ...
Read More

Saints v Sale

By shendyNo Comments
It's been a while since I've posted any rugby photos. The Brother and I always go to the last home game of the season - the weather is often good and it's a chance to show our appreciation for the players who are leaving, and this year it was particularly worthwhile as two of the fans favourites were playing their last home game - Soane Tonga'uiga and Brian Mujati. And it was a lovely day on Saturday - I do enjoy watching a game in the sunshine in a t-shirt, although I do think that rugby should be a winter game. It has to be said though that the sun, particularly later in the game, did make shooting quite difficult. To top it all off, Saints thrashed a relatively inexperienced Sale Sharks side 47-7, with Sale's 7 points coming with no time left at the end of the game. Oh, and the Saints had the decency to score 4 second-half tries down in "my"...
Read More

Saints v Leicester

By shendyNo Comments
I've not been to the rugby for a while - the last game was 3 months ago and that was in Milton Keynes, so it was good to get back to Franklin's Gardens - especially as the sun was out! It was a huge game - Saints v local rivals Leicester, and with 1/3 of the England squad playing it was always going to be full-on. Just a shame that things didn't quite go according to plan, with Leicester winning 35-21. Here's the pick of the pics A somewhat unorthodox tackling style from Manu Tuilagi Ben Foden Paul Diggin Geoff Parling Ben Youngs Chris Ashton beats Alesana Tuilagi to the ball - in defence rather than attack unfortunately Dan Cole Toby Flood looks quite pleased to score his second try Stephen Myler The full set are on my website....
Read More