Russells Creek playing-coach Cam Williams to trial for Victorian Country team

The current Russells Creek playing coach - who is preparing for the state trial match on Sunday 27 November in Bendigo - believes pulling on the Victorian colours is the "pinnacle" for country cricketers.

"It's huge, it's the pinnacle for any Victorian local cricketer," he told The Standard.

"I don't care what anyone says about it, there's some fantastic, skilful, hard bush cricketers. I look at Ben Boyd as the example, he's a stalwart around here and everyone knows how good he's been for Warrnambool and Victoria and he commands respect.

"At the end of the day, it's the pinnacle winning the Australian championships for Victoria and going home to your mates, family, your teammates, you can be proud knowing we've represented you really well."

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The keeper-batsman was part of Victoria's championship winning side in 2019-20 and has been an integral member of the team for the past three championships. He now desperately wants the chance to be part of the title defence.

Across the 29 matches he has played for Victoria, the bricklayer has scored 482 runs, with 24 catches and 17 stumpings.

It is confirmed he will be the only one of the four Western Waves zone members from the title winning side to trial again.

"I'd like to think off the back of the three years, the record kind of speaks for itself, but there is a new coach and he might want to bring in some new faces," he said.

"It's like anything, when you try out for these squads, you have to play well on the right day in front of the right people and hopefully get selected. I'm looking forward to putting my name up again and hopefully it goes my way.

"Putting pressure yourself to score runs when you go there, you're already failing. I'll go in with a clear mindset and back my skills and shot selection. If you go well, it'll hopefully re-jig the memory of the selectors and they'll know what you can offer."

The classy left-hander - who has spent time at Essendon with two first XI caps and has years of Country Week experience with Warrnambool - says he is working hard on his game and is coming off a typically industrious 40 to guide his Creekers to a low-scoring two-wicket win against Dennington on Saturday.

"Each year as you get one year older, you're always learning. You're always trying to learn new tricks as you get more experience," he said.

"Year in year out, you want to re-jig your game, but cricket is 85 per cent above shoulders, if you have the hand-eye coordination it's all about what's upstairs.

"It's only early doors in the season, sometimes you hit them well and sometimes you don't in the nets, but I'm really looking forward to just playing matches of cricket, especially the trial match just to get more cricket in because of what we lost earlier."

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