Potts is honoured by a Fly Past

In cricket, a lack of confidence is something that is very easy to diagnose in a player, but extremely difficult to put right.

My own confidence has suffered lately after a series of very poor bowling performances. It got to the point where I started to think I should give up altogether. To be fair, my team mates have been thinking the same thing for a number of years.

However, it is amazing how different everything looks when something positive happens and this week it did! I took my first wicket of the season, and two more followed.

The first wicket was accompanied by a strange sound from the heavens. Naturally, I thought even the gods were appealling to the umpire on my behalf but something very different turned out to be the cause.

As I stood in the middle of the pitch being congratulated by my team mates, a five helicopter formation flew overhead. I was of course delighted that the authorities had seen fit to mark my first wicket with a fly past, but I did wonder how much fuel they had consumed in the previous six weeks of waiting.

I later found out that there was an Air Show at RAF Cosford (the local air base) and the likelihood was that the helicopters were en route. I'm not so sure. Next time I take a wicket(please let there be a next time) I shall settle for no less than a Spitfire, the Red Arrows and a Lancaster Bomber.