Bennell entrusted with EGCA captaincy for annual country week series

Great Boulder all-rounder Bevan Bennell’s masterful blend of skill and experience has earned him the captaincy of the Eastern Goldfields Cricket Association’s No.1 team for the annual country week series.

Bennell will lead an A-section group in Perth from January 19-24, keen to go one better than a year ago when they were beaten in the final by Albany.

The brilliant right-hander starred at the 2024 series with three centuries while compiling 380 runs at 190.00 to earn the Barry Shepherd Medal as player of the carnival.

Bennell captained the EGCA’s last Boan Cup triumph in 2020 and his six innings this season at domestic level has yielded three centuries for a competition-best 305 runs at 152.50.

Great Boulder teammate Alex Jerrard will captain the association’s No.2 team, contesting E-section.

Neither team is finalised, but EGCA chairman Andrew Zafer expected both groups would be competitive.

Among a provisional 28-player squad named before Christmas, promising youngster Alijah Evans is the only withdrawal due to elbow surgery.

Alongside Bennell, it includes top-four batters, Hannans’ Graham Kennedy (294 runs at 58.80) and Aarib Tareen Khan (281 runs at 46.83), and Great Boulder’s Waqar Ali Ahmed (245 runs at 40.83).

Also named in the squad is Hannans’ UK recruit Harry Merritt-Blann, who leads all local bowlers with 18 wickets at 12.22.

“At the moment, we’ve got a couple of blokes who are 50-50 (to make the trip),” Zafer said,

“That’s why we’re waiting – just to gauge their availability before confirming two official teams.

“But we’re happy with the make-up of the squad and we think we can be competitive – especially after losing the A-section final last year.

“We’ll be taking away a side that we feel can at least match that achievement and hopefully go on and actually win the big one, if we play some great cricket.”

Zafer said it was a challenging time of the year to lure each of the region’s best players for the trip.

“It’s always been a challenge because a lot of our players are involved in the mining industry,” he said.

“Trying to get them away from work for a week can be difficult.

“But we’ve had communications with each of the clubs for a couple of months and the dates were set, so a lot of them have been granted leave so they can get away.

“We don’t have the luxury of being only an hour, or even a couple of hours, outside of Perth so we can’t call on different players daily.

“We have to take away a set group for a week, but it’s something we’ve always overcome.

“And like I say, we’re confident we can bring back the Boan Cup for the first time in a while while hopefully also getting our E-section side promoted.”

Zafer said the onus was on the No.2 team to perform well after traditionally competing in the higher divisions.

They were fifth last year in E-section.

“We feel we should be, at the very least, in C-section,” Zafer said.

“But we had to withdraw our second team a few years ago and unfortunately you have to go back to the bottom in order to work your way up again.

“But there seems to be strong commitment from each of the players which is great.”