Dave Edwards

After getting involved reluctantly in a plot to fix the third grade grand final, The Grade Cricketer decides to chuck in the sport that he has wasted his youth on. At 31, it is time for him to re-invent himself, go to uni and maybe marry. This goes awry immediately when his girlfriend leaves him, he has to move back home with his disapproving parents and he sees no career beckoning other than working in a sports store.

Eventually, like a recovering drug addict, he succumbs to the temptation of playing in a social game. His father chucks him out immediately for reneging on his promise to go straight, and he finds himself in a share house with one of his cricketing mates. Slowly but surely, he finds himself sucked back into the soul-sapping world of rigs, circuits, chops, champs and all the rest of the macho one-upmanship of grade cricket. All the while, his cricket declines to the point where his blood-alcohol content sometimes exceeds his career batting average.

While not as funny as the first book, this is probably a better effort as a novel, with a story arc that develops the main characters and takes them through a gradual awakening to maturity and a life beyond grade cricket. The disturbing macho attitudes of the first book are now laid bare as corrosive obstacles to the enjoyment of a full life and the joy of a sport that The Grade Cricketer once loved.… (more)