All Out Cricket in at Lord's

Date released: 24 February 2010

Mark Butcher sizes up a new bat All Out Cricket magazine visited the MCC Indoor School for their annual 'gear test' trying out new cricket equipment for the 2010 season - with an all-star cast.

Five former internationals: Mark Butcher, Graeme Hick, Mark Alleyne (MCC Head Coach), Peter Such and Alex Tudor. Butcher and Hick were both recently made Honorary Life Members of MCC.

The quintet then put a range of kit through its paces in the MCC Indoor School nets - giving their feedback straight to the All Out Cricket (AOC) team.

AOC editor, Andy Afford told Lords.org: "It's our annual gear test. We're focusing mainly on bats this year.

"We ask all the main manufacturers to send us blank bats - with no logos. Then we cover up any other identifying marks so it's a completely blind, independent test.

Peter Such gives his feedback on this bat "With the bats we get the guys to mark them in three categories: first impression; pick-up; and performance. Obviously the overall score each bat gets is heavily weighted towards performance."

With Mark Butcher still praising a bat he called ‘The Daddy’ and reluctantly returning it to AOC, Afford explained why they come to Lord's?

"It's a good location." Afford explains. "There's great facilities. None of the players mind coming to meet us if we're at Lord's.

"We've had some of the MCC's Young Cricketers helping us out, doing throw-downs in the nets too.

"It's in a good spot in London too - we saw Sir Paul McCartney this morning!

"It's just nice to see men, professional sportsmen, behaving like little boys really - it's just boys with toys. We have great fun."

The results of the gear test, including the winning bat, are in the next issue of All Out Cricket out on 4th March.