Nathan Mann will soon head to the Philippines in pursuit of his professional golf dream, doing the hard work to try and make a living from the game. At age 23, the golf pro is committed to realising that dream – earning his playing card on the Philippines tour the focus now.
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In the meantime, Mann this year returned to playing cricket for the first time since he gave the sport away late in high school to focus on golf.
And at Riverside 2 on Saturday afternoon, in a Twenty20 defeat of West Tamworth, he was in cricketing nirvana as his right-arm medium pacers shredded Wests batting lineup and he finished with the astonishing figures of 7-14 off 3.1 overs. Adding to the wow factor: Souths’ stand-in teen skipper Conrad George used Mann as his seventh bowler.
It has to be said, however, that it was not the strongest Wests side. But under any circumstance, it was a mighty effort.
It was only Mann’s fourth first-grade match. He has played mainly second grade this season. Prior to Saturday’s match, he had only bowled 27 overs in 10 matches in both grades and taken just two wickets.
Of the best bowling performance of his life “by a long way”, he said: “I just bowled at the stumps, a couple of bad shots and a couple of misses and that was about it … I was happy to take a few today.”
Four of Mann’s victims were bowled and one was trapped lbw, as Wests were dismissed for 95 in 18.1 overs.
A former professional trainee at Tamworth Golf Club, Mann, who works as a barman at the club, said he returned to cricket this year “for a bit of fun – something different to what I normally do”. “We’ll just see what happens for the rest of the season,” he said, adding that he would like to play more first grade.
“I used to play cricket every season when I was a kid, but I gave it up to follow my career in golf. A few of the guys got me back to playing this year, and I’m kinda glad I did now.”
Mann said he played on Asia’s secondary golf tour last year, the first time he had held a tour card. He did not have any great results, but gained valuable experience.
He started his traineeship at Tamworth Golf Club in 2015, but “pulled the pin” on it in 2017 to focus on tournament play. He thanked the club for giving him the chance to do that, knowing that he still had a job waiting for him as a barman if needed.
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“It’s pretty tough to make a living [from golf] straight up,” he said. “You’ve really got to get on one of those bigger tours to do that. The last couple of years have been experience and sort of working my way up through the ranks.”
On Saturday, Souths recorded back-to-back T20 wins after winning the toss and batting. They finished on 7-149, with James Psarakis (43) and Chris Skilton (40 not out) top-scoring. Grant Popplewell bagged 3-26 off four overs.
Shaun Stevenson (32) top-scored for Wests.
