Pembrokeshire In Focus: Bowled over by England performance

People tend to look at me as if I’m a bit strange when they discover I like cricket. I don’t know why it should be so shocking that a woman can happily sit through a whole Test match – and understand what is going on.

With cricket in my blood, I would spend many a childhood Saturday afternoon walking around the boundary with my pals with our bottles of coke and packets of crisps, climbing onto the rollers and playing in the nets. Admittedly, as we got older our attentions may have veered slightly from the game to the players themselves. And we progressed from coke to cider with varying consequences.

I’m not sure I should reveal this to a worldwide audience, but I will also confess to having a bit of a crush on Shane Warne as a teen – but that was a long time ago. It was when he looked at his best and cricket was what he was best known for. It was a fleeting infatuation and no, he didn’t send me any texts.

Anyway, I digress. Last week we made the long-winded train journey up to Cardiff for a day at the England v Sri Lanka Test. And, unsurprisingly, I took my camera. My kit is slightly limited so I had to make do with my 55-200mm lens. It was day two and England were in the field so I snapped a few close-up shots of the players. I have cropped some of the action shots - I shot in RAW and kept the ISO down, knowing that I’d need to crop them. There are so many things on my kit wish list, but a longer lens is near the top of it. I just need to keep saving the pennies.

Day two was the only day rain didn’t interrupt play and it seemed England were set for a draw at best, so it was a bit of a shock to see them bowl Sri Lanka for just 82 on day five and win the first Test by an innings and 14 runs.

First shot of the day: Stuart Broad in bowling action...