{"id":567233,"date":"2026-05-05T10:32:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-05T10:32:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/567233\/"},"modified":"2026-05-05T10:32:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T10:32:15","slug":"thurrock-cricketers-delight-as-she-plays-marylebone-at-lords","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/567233\/","title":{"rendered":"Thurrock cricketer&#8217;s delight as she plays Marylebone at Lord&#8217;s"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Afra described to Victoria Polley on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sounds\/play\/m002vf8w\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">BBC Essex&#8217;s Around the Wicket<\/a> show how she &#8220;felt the excitement going through my blood&#8221; when she was named captain.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The side was made up of children from across the country, all of whom attend state schools.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Afra attends Harris Academy in Chafford Hundred and normally plays for Belhus Cricket Club.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Recalling meeting her new teammates, she said: &#8220;Everyone was just as excited as everyone.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;All the girls are so nice, so lovely, the kindest people ever. We were just going through the same feelings together.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Although her team lost the contest, Afra said she was &#8220;really happy&#8221; with her performance and was left glowing about the day.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Her parents, Shafeena and Baiju, were left bowled over by their daughter as they watched on from the famous members&#8217; pavilion at Lord&#8217;s.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Shafeena said: &#8220;Naturally, we are very proud of Afra. This was a truly special and surreal experience for her, and for us to be there to witness it.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;An unforgettable day with memories we will treasure forever.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Afra described to Victoria Polley on BBC Essex&#8217;s Around the Wicket show how she &#8220;felt the excitement going&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":567234,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1721,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-567233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-cricket","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/567233","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=567233"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/567233\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/567234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=567233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=567233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=567233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}