Freyberg man hits milestone

Posted by Dan Richardson, Manawatu Standard on 21 January 2010 | 0 Comments

Freyberg's Dave Fulton passed a milestone at the weekend, which is not likely to be reached in Manawatu club cricket any time soon.

The 44-year-old all-rounder passed 10,000 premier-one runs across one-day and two-day games.

Fulton, who recently stood down as chief groundsman for Manawaroa and Ongley parks, began the season needing 101 runs and after a slow start to the summer passed the milestone with a boundary during his innings of 83.

The number excludes runs made in Twenty20 competitions and any appearances for the reserve team.

It has taken 24 seasons to tick off the mark and Fulton said it was in the back of his mind all summer.

"I suppose it was a bit of a relief. I didn't mind too much," he said.

"It worried my young fella more because he kept reminding me each week."

Freyberg has an extensive statistics database which includes all their players who have had a run for the senior side since their establishment in 1971.

The statistics were first compiled by Dan Reddix in the early 1990s after he researched the old scorebooks and have been continued since, with the hope of getting them on to a website soon.

"We try to keep it so guys know when they are coming up to 100 wickets or 1000 runs," Fulton explained.

He is a veteran of the Manawatu club scene and his 10,000 runs included 16 hundreds, with a best of 140 not out against United.

He also has more than 5000 runs for Manawatu and it's unlikely the 10,000 run mark will be passed at club level because top players are called in to Central Districts duty or would have to play close to 20 seasons.

To put it into perspective, Palmerston Cricket Club is one of the other clubs who keep detailed records and their top scorer is Red Norris with 7018 runs.

Norris was a curious case himself and played around the time of World War II and made the runs from 292 innings during a 25-year span which ended in 1960.

Fulton is from the old school when it comes to his attitude to dedicating his time to playing the game, rather than missing games regularly to attend weddings, 21sts or other events.

"People don't stay in the sport that long now. They probably aren't as committed as we were.

"When you play, you play."

As for how many seasons he has left in him, Fulton said he would be happy to play for the reserve side if it meant giving the youngsters a go in the premier competition.

"Things seem to be going well at the moment," he said of his batting, but added he wanted to be able to watch his sons play too.