Ben O'Brien

Ben joined the club at the start of the 2019 season from Ashington.

Took part in an opening stand of 190 with Intisaar Fazal against Alnwick the fifth highest partnership ever for the First Eleven and the third stand in a row between the two in excess of 50.

Ended his first season with 760 runs and 39 wickets winning the Division 2 player of the year from the league.

Scored 50 and took 5 wickets in July 2021 against Blagdon, becoming only the third playerto complete the feat twice. The following week took a Hat-trick against Bedlington, remarkably the second of the innings as they lost 6 wickets without scoring a run.

Scored his first century for the club, an unbeaten 134, at Consett in June 2022. During the innings Ben took part in three separate 50 run partnerships while his 8 sixes equalled the 1XI record for a single innings.

In August 2022 after Tynedale had scored 294 Ben took part in the second highest partnership of all time with 217 for the first, Ben scoring 142 before John Lumb was out for 60. Ben went on to reach a club record highest individual score of 194 off 140 balls with 23 fours and 7 sixes before being dismissed trying to score the winning runs with the six he needed to reach his 200. During the inning Ben became the 16th player to reach 2,000 league runs for the 1XI, only Wayne Rizema (whose 180* he passed in the match) reached the mark faster. The chase of 294 was also a 1XI record.

The final game of the 2022 season saw Ben record his third century of the year and his second against Consett, equalling Lloyd Anderson's record of 3 in a season. The innings also saw two other club records fall with his fifth century partnership and 29th six of the season both one more than the previous records while he also became the fifth player to score over 100 fours in a season. 909 runs was the third highest in a single season while his final batting average of 64.93 has only been bettered by Brett Elliott back in 1991 who averaged 66

The lure of home town club Ashington getting promoted to the North East Premier League for the first time saw Ben move back for the start of the 2023 season. Retuns to Ponteland in 2024