St George’s beware, Janeiro Tucker is not thinking about retiring just yet and wants another century in Cup Match.

He has good reason for optimism, too, as Wellington Oval, next year’s venue, is his favourite ground after scoring all four of his centuries there.

The 39-year-old Somerset player picked up a third Cup Match Safe Hands Award yesterday, sponsored by Bermuda Healthcare Services and Brown-Darrell Clinic, receiving the Cal “Bummy” Symonds trophy, a cheque for $1,000 and two travel vouchers for best catch in Cup Match, a one-handed low return catch off St George’s captain Oronde Bascome in the second innings.

Tucker held six catches in the match, three in each innings, to establish a new record with 27 catches in Cup Match. He won the Safe Hands awards in 1998, the inaugural year, and again in 2003.

Tucker’s performance made up for his first first-ball duck in Cup Match in the first innings, but he insists that there are still more runs to come from his bat. Already he holds the record for most runs in Cup Match.

“I want to score another hundred in Cup Match and I really want to get one at Somerset but I don’t know what I’ve got to do to get one in Somerset,” Tucker said yesterday.

“If it comes in St George’s I’ll take it, I’ve had four in St George’s. My highest in Somerset is 89.”

Tucker caught Fiqre Crockwell, Bascome and Rodney Trott in the first innings and Jason Anderson, Bascome and George O’Brien in the second. “And I dropped one,” he added, referring to the one-handed effort put down off OJ Pitcher when he was on 50 in the first innings.

“I just happened to be in the right spot taking the slip catches and the last one off Jason in the short cover area.”

Tucker is the oldest player in the Somerset team, having made his debut in 1996, and his eventual retirement will leave a big hole to fill, though Somerset appear to have the nucleus of a team that could stay together for several years and possibly dominate for a few more years.

“When you look at the team you have me at 39, then the captain at 30 and with everybody else 26, 25, 19,” Tucker said.

“I think Somerset have a good future ahead with the guys they have up there.

“They could still bring Stephen [Outerbridge] back, Dion Stovell back, guys who could take over when I leave. Even a youngster like Alex Dore who plays for Rangers. I think Somerset’s future is looking real good.

“Somerset built their team from the last four or five years and I think they did a good job in rebuilding and now St George’s are trying to rebuild their team. I just think Somerset have the better youth players coming through right now. Delray [Rawlins] is a good pick-up for them, he has a lot of ability and will be around for a long time to come.”

St George’s stalwart Dennis Wainwright, who is on the committee that selects the Safe Hands Award, concedes that St George’s have some work to do if they are going to wrestle the cup from the west enders. He is particularly concerned about the strength of their bowling.

“Somerset have a good team but St George’s are not far off,” Wainwright said. “What St George’s are lacking is a couple of bowlers. Somerset’s strategy this year was training, no trial matches [except the final one], while St George’s had trial matches.

“With training you can build a good team and sort people out if they don’t show up for training. What trial matches do is help the revenue of the club because people come around. Trial matches increase the excitement and I always liked trial matches.”

Wainwright was playing for St George’s during the era when they went 20 years unbeaten between 1959 and 1979, including nine years in the 1960s when they won eight years out of nine when Symonds was captain.

“When St George’s dominated it was an era when we started out with Kenny Paul, a bowler who could bowl out any team, and we had a backup in Alfred ‘Fleas’ Hall,” said Wainwright, who is now 78 and the last of the older generation that is still an active member of the club.

“Then we had a top spinner in Fred ‘Dickty’ Trott, then later Lee Raynor came, then [Clarence] Parfitt came and we were constantly building on our bowling team.

“Batsmen don’t win matches, bowlers win matches and the reason we were able to dominate is because we had a team of bowlers who could bowl out any team any time, including the West Indies team in 1955.

“When I started Carlton Welch was a top captain, then Clarence Simmons when we won the trophy.

“When he retired, Cal Symonds took over and Cal, being the aggressive person that he is and with the knowledge from playing under those two and Leroy ‘Tubby’ Richardson, he was able to put it into practice.

“It was easy because he had a passionate team of winners, and we went all out to prepare ourselves.”