The Sunday Service

Welcome back to The Sunday Service!

This week, we meet our newest member of the parish, Mr Gompertz, and we hear about his first few days as he settles into his new surroundings.

Elsewhere, Mr Church has his bush trimmed into the shape of Sir Geoffrey, although this causes some unforeseen issues...

We also hear our newest feature of the Service, 'Cricket in Three with WG', thanks to WG Rumblepants.

And we also hear Churchy speak to Chris Coleman, Director of
Cricket Participation at the Surrey Foundation. They work with...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers – we hope you've all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark brings some sad news to the Parish.

In a hard-hitting Sermon, Mark reveals that Hector is leaving the Parish after 36 fantastic services at the pulpit. "It has been a joy and a pleasure to serve at The Parish, and I will miss our weekly catchups" Hector announced to the village hall this week.

But fear not, The Sunday Service will continue, as Churchy is well-met at the crease by a new ad...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers – we hope you've all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by the CEO and mastermind behind our fantastic sponsors, Newbery Cricket.

Having left school at 16, David White began work as a groundskeeper before moving into a variety of coaching roles, including serving as a County Age Group coach at Surrey.

He then moved into operations, joining Newbery initially as Chief Operating Officer after leaving West Ham, where he was Head of Operations.

Now the CEO of...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers – we hope you've all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, we continue Mark's conversation with one of the most beloved voices in cricket, who has also recently been inducted into the NZC Hall of Fame.

In 52 Test matches, he scored 2,668 runs, including three centuries and 16 half-centuries, while also taking 27 wickets.

He also claims the unique accolade of captaining New Zealand to three historic, successive Test series victories in 1985 and 1986: against Australia in Australia, against Australia in New Zealand, and against England in En...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark is joined by one of the most loved voices in cricket, who has also recently been inducted into the NZC Hall of Fame.

In 52 Test matches, he scored 2668 Test runs with three centuries and 16 half-centuries, while taking 27 Test wickets along the way. 

He also claims the prolific accolade of captaining New Zealand to three historic, and successive, Test series victories in 1985 and 1986: against Australia in Australia, against Australia in New...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Hector is joined by one of the biggest content creators in the world of cricket.

With over 150,000 followers on all platforms, and over 100 million views on his content, his rise up the social media echelons has been exponential.

Working under the title ‘What’s He On About?’, he produces podcasts and insight-driven content: from World Cup predictions to village cricket sketches and interviews.

He’s worked with the giants of...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by someone who can tell you everything you need to know about the game.

Having begun her career in the civil service, straight out of university, she ended up making a career switch to sports journalism after becoming a third voice with the BBC. 

Now a cricket reporter at the Times and Sunday Times, she is one of the most trusted voices in the game.

If we cast our minds back to the 24th of October, 2025, some of our most devoted listeners will remember a certain Church sermon that graced the airwaves.

The sermon itself came as the clocks were preparing to tick back - the cricket season was done and dusted, and it was time to hunker down for the winter.

Referring to 'the good book', Mark Church began a weekly sermon from the cricketing pulpit that has since been an ever present on the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers.

As a special episode, the Parish...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by someone who has made some brilliant things happen at the Kia Oval in recent years.

He began his cricketing journey with Opta Sports - working across scoring, analytics, and data collection - before heading to Australia for a few years, where he worked in a number of roles from Tasmania to Melbourne, aka 'the greatest city in the world'.

On his return to England in...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Hector is joined by a champion of West Indies cricket.

Having spent 22 years in the education industry - he is about to bow out as a Vice Principal at Sedgehill Academy. 

Now, he is turning his attention wholeheartedly to the media world in which he has had much success so far. Alongside commentary duties for the BBC and TalkSPORT, he also covers EFL matches for PA Media.

Most not...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by one of the great Sports Photographers.

Having started off at Varley Picture Agency before spending 10 years at the Press Association, he moved to Getty Images in 2011 - where he has been a staff photographer ever since.

He has recently released his new book, entitled: ‘Picture of England: 20 years photographing the England Men’s Cricket Team Home and Away’ which has since flown off the shelf. <...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark is alone in the parish.

His guest this week was born in California, but grew up in Western Australia, before making his professional debut back in 2014. Twelve years later, he has had to call time on his playing career due to an ankle injury - which he had first damaged in 2024.

He finishes his career with over 2,000 first-class runs and 60 first-class wickets, with a further 800+ runs and 57 wickets in wh...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by a trailblazer in the sports turf industry.

Hailing from Christchurch, New Zealand, she made the jump over to England in 2022, where she began work for Gloucestershire County Cricket Club. 

In 2023, she led the first fully-female groundsteam in the UK, and prepared the wicket at Edgbaston for the first T20 of the women’s Ashes series. 

Among a whole host of awards that she ha...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by the Editor of the widely adored 'Bible of cricket'.

Having studied Modern Languages at Cambridge, graduating with a first, he started work experience with Wisden Cricket Monthly, before covering County cricket for The Daily Telegraph and freelancing for the Gaurdian and Sunday Times.

He joined the Daily Mail in 2009, and was appointed Editor of Wisden Almanack three years later.

Now, he has ju...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week's guest captained Warwickshire to six trophies in two years during the 1990’s, earning him the reputation as one of the games greatest domestic captains. He also played three Tests for England and 29 One Day Internationals - including the World Cup Final in 1992.

After retiring, he became a familiar face and voice on international cricket coverage - including England Test Matches. But on the Eve of the 2005 Ashes series he left Channel 4, after admi...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by an elite fast-bowling coach and consultant.

This man has coached a wide array of teams - from working with a number of counties, to Head Coaching the Bangladesh A side, to being the bowling coach in the final of an under-19 World Cup - he is one of the most respected bowling coaches out there.

Having played professionally for Gloucestershire before entering the coaching wo...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by one of the great cricket journalists, with a special love for the domestic game.

He has worked for The Cricketer since shortly before the 2019 World Cup - when he joined from CNN Sport - winning the Christopher Martin Jenkins Young journalist of the Year award in 2020.

Now leading The Cricketer’s coverage of the women’s game, and writing regular features on county cricket, he can...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by a legend of the 'turf management' game. 

Having begun his grounds career back in 1996, this man has worked his way up the ladder, and is now a Test match-level Head Groundsman - marshalling his charges at Chester-le-Street since 2015. A 'Professional Groundsman of the Year' award back in 2017 - an award covering groundswork across all sports - is a good indicator of his prestige within the industry.

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by one of the greats of the 'X' world. 

With 25.3 thousand followers on the platform formerly known as 'Twitter', this man hosts one of the great cricket accounts. His iPad Art, 'Today's beautiful cricket ground' segment, and County Championship countdown clock turns his platform into a cricketing community. 

WG RumblePants joins the show to chat all about his love for cricket, the origins and practicalities of h...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by the former Durham batter, turned coach, Ash Thorpe.

Having been born in Australia, playing cricket for the Western Australia Under-19s, Ash made his first-class debut for Durham against Sri Lanka back in 2002.

Now Head of Cricket at Parkview Academy of Sport, Ash also runs his own academy - as well as being a regular face on commentary for the Durham livestream. Joining this we...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector come together at the Kia Oval for a special podcast.

Church and Vickers are joined by the Chief Executive of the Desert Vipers, Phil Oliver - fresh from his side's first ILT20 title in January.

Having co-founded CricViz - spending seven years there as Managing Director before making the switch to the Vipers - it's hard to find anyone better placed to talk about leadership in cricket.

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector reunite at the Holy Ground. It's the first time the pair have recorded at the Kia Oval in 6 episodes, so you just know it's going to be special.

Church and Vickers are joined by the Chief Executive of Essex Cricket Club, Dan Feist, who has spent over 14 years at the club.

As everybody knows, domestic cricket in this country is facing an interesting future. With the investment in...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark sits down with Bryony Smith to discuss her career, last summer, and her aims for the season to come.

Bryony lifted the Vitality T20 Blast trophy last year - as the first professional captain of the Surrey women’s team.

She made her Surrey debut in 2014 and made 60* in her second game against Yorkshire. She quickly became one of the first names on the team sheet and has played 11 time...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, England's Young Lions were, regrettably, 'Sooryavanshi-ed'.

But, with Churchy spinning his web on Test Match Special and Hector trying to spin one of his own from the ground, we thought it prudent to touch on the Under-19 World Cup as a whole.

To help with this, we hear a snippet from Hector's interview with a young Thomas Rew - captain extraordinaire and future star - at training, less than 24-hours be...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Hector is joined by an ICC Hall-of-Famer. He captained Zimbabwe and is widely regarded as their greatest player of all time - and with 12 Test match hundreds, 27 Test 50s, and a record breaking unbeaten double-hundred against India, it's hard to argue otherwise.

Within his first two years as England's Head Coach, he had won two Ashes (home and away), took the Test side to number one in the world, and won England's fi...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark is joined by one of the greats of our game. He's captained Surrey to four County Championship titles over the last seven years, and has the small matter of 14,122 First Class runs to his name.

He doesn't tend to sit down for long interviews, but Churchy's managed to collar him into one today - his day, in fact - Burns night.

Rory Burns joins the pod discuss his journey in...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark is joined by former Sussex batsman Mark Newell who has been a professional umpire since 2017.

Mark talks to Mark about his cricketing journey from playing to being the man in the middle for first class cricket in this country.

Mark also gives some great advice to anybody who is considering taking up umpiring and being involved in the game.

Also on the episode, Church and Vickers continue th...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by the CEO of the MCC Foundation, Angus Berry. Having set up his own non-profit organisation to help sports clubs engage with their communities, Angus has always wanted to make the game more accessible and harness its unifying powers.

Now, as CEO of the MCCF, he talks through the Foundation’s incredible plans to facilitate accessibility with great social impact, with a focus on the Barclays Knight-Stokes Cup...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by one of the most comforting voices in the game and a stalwart of Northamptonshire CCC. 

Having joined BBC Radio Northampton in the 1980s, Andrew Radd became the club's official archivist last year and was presented with the Association of Cricket Statisticians and Historians' (ACS) statistician of the year award. 

Having authored a number of books about Northants and its personalities, Andrew takes us through his...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week and a VERY joyous Christmas.

This week is the big one. Some might even say it's monumental. It is, of course, the highly awaited Christmas special. And to mark this special day, Church and Vickers were treated to TWO guests.

Beaming in from Melbourne, fresh after a 20-'wicketed' day at the MCG, Daniel Norcross and Andy Zaltzman continued to grace the airwaves long after their working day had concluded.  

The two Test Mat...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by the editor of The Cricketer Magazine, Huw Turbervill. Having previously spent 15 years at The Telegraph, Huw joined The Cricketer in 2015, producing the monthly magazine for 11 years, and has been Editor for the past four years.

Huw takes us through his career in print journalism, discusses how sports media has developed alongside social media and AI, and offers his overall assessment of the industry's strength.

He...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by one of the all-time county greats. With 11,387 First Class runs and 534 First Class wickets under his belt, he retired from the professional arena in 2021. He won the County Championship with both Surrey and Warwickshire, and his impressive career culminated in 2 Test Matches and 20 ODI appearances for England - with many calling for more.

Now working as the Director of Cricket at King Edwards, Witley, Rikki joins th...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by one of the best sports psychologists in the country. Now based at Brentford FC, Michael Caulfield spent over 15 years working alongside Hampshire CCC whilst also being involved with Sussex CCC, and continues to keep in touch and help cricket players across the country.

Michael talks about how he transitioned from being the Chief Executive of the Professional Jockeys Association to a sports psychologist, the best ways in...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by the internationally renowned sports artist, Andy Brown. Andy was the official artist at last year's IPL, and has put many iconic moments to canvas, including capturing Sir Jimmy Anderson's 700th wicket in Dharamshala, and later presenting the painting to the great himself.

Specializing in baseball and cricket, Andy has been travelling the world for over a decade, capturing live moments and immortalizing them on canvas. He jo...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector connect with their roots. Friend of the podcast, Steve Couslon, joins the show to take us through his journey into Chaplaincy, and discusses the holy combination of cricket and worship.

As the Vicar of St Mark's, Kennington, and Chaplain of Surrey CCC, Steve couldn't be better placed to critique Mark Church's weekly sermons, offering a generous comparison in his conclusion.

Helping players and fans alike, Steve is an...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by none other than Australia's 'Voice of Summer'. Having joined ABC in 1973 and then Test Match Special 10 years later, Jim Maxwell brings over 50 years of experience in broadcasting and journalism to the Sunday Service.

Jim discusses his early career and tips for broadcasting, and clues Church and Vickers in on the one book that anyone interested in good sports writing must read.

The commentary legend al...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector are joined by cricketing royalty. As both player and journalist, this man is up there with the best of the best, offering unrivalled insight into the world of cricket media.

Michael Atherton joins the show to discuss his fascinating career in broadcasting and journalism; the transition from playing to journalism, how he balances his Sky Sports commentary and writing for the Times, and his advice to all young journalists lo...

Welcome back to the Sunday Service with Church and Vickers - we hope you’ve all had a peaceful cricketing week.

This week, Mark and Hector were fortunate enough to chat with Emma Calvert, the Director of Women’s Cricket at Surrey County Cricket Club.

Emma provides a brilliant insight into the growing world of women’s sport, the recent professionalisation of women’s cricket, and the life of a Director of Cricket. Hear for yourself as Emma takes the hosts through just how much work goes on behind the scenes of a professional sporting outfit.<...

Welcome to the brand new cricket podcast, 'Sunday Service with Church and Vickers'.

In the opening episode, co-hosts Mark Church and Hector Vickers discuss what to expect from the series, and Hector interviews Mark on his broadcasting career with the BBC.

The hosts also give their cricketing observations of the week, and Mark opens his weekly segment, "The Church Sermon".

The podcast is delighted to be sponsored by Newbery Cricket, working together to host the ultimate cricket competition, with an exciting Christmas giveaway on offer.

Mark and Hector are keen to...