EDWARDS TAKES OVER AT LYTHAM BUT PAYS TRIBUTE TO SKEM

Date: 17th October 2016

A Paul Edwards copyright exclusive for L&DCC Official Website.

..... as he returns to Scott Rees Park.

Danny Edwards has admitted it was a tough call to leave second division champions Skelmersdale to return to his former club, Lytham, and the divisional player of the year has also credited the Scott Rees Park club for reviving his enthusiasm for cricket.

Edwards took 66 wickets at 14 runs apiece during his single season at Skem but when the offer came to take up a first-team captaincy role, he decided it was one he could not pass up.

“It was a big decision to leave Skelmersdale,” he said. “A couple of clubs asked me to join them but when Lytham, my old club, where I’d played for four years, offered me the captaincy, I just couldn’t turn it down.

I had a brilliant year at Skem. Ben and Steve Maddocks did a magnificent job in managing the side and the team spirit was great. There was an excellent atmosphere there and it was simply a joy to play cricket at the club.

I was taking cricket less seriously before I went to Skem but going there revitalised me and rekindled my passion for the game.”

Now, though, instead of anticipating a year in the First Division, Edwards is planning for his return to the ECB Premier League and is even drawing up a list of recruitment targets.

“Lytham would admit they under-achieved, given the quality they had,” he said. “We are going to lose two, probably three players this close-season because Dom O’Brien’s gone back to Australia and Gary Knight’s rejoined Ormskirk. But we’ve already lined up James McDonough to take on the wicket-keeping job. James went back to Vernon Carus for a year but he’s coming back to us.

“There are other signings on the way and we should be able to announce them quite soon. We’re looking to get a first-class or international quality opening batsman.”

And Edwards will need little introduction to most of the players at Church Road, where he spent four seasons before moving to Skem in 2015.

“I grew up playing for Penwortham and then moved for half a season to BAC in the Palace Shield before making the move from the Shield to the Liverpool Competition when I joined Lytham,” he said. “It’s a brilliant standard of cricket.

“If you just look at the signings Bootle and Northern have made in the last few weeks, the Premier League is going to be a very strong league next summer and I don’t think anywhere else in the north west matches it. It’s a phenomenal standard for league cricket.”