A HEREFORDSHIRE cricket enthusiast has officially played his favourite sport at the highest level.

Kinsey Hern has returned home to Lyonshall after tackling the slopes of Mount Everest and taking part in a record-breaking Twenty20 match.

Kinsey, who turned 28 while on the trek, was one of 30 competitors, plus support staff, who jointly set the world record for the highest altitude cricket match ever played.

“The trip was amazing, a real once-in-alifetime venture, although it’s definitely one experience you appreciate much more once it’s over,” said Kinsey, who came back from Nepal three quarters of a stone lighter and on antibiotics for fatigue. “I’ve never looked forward to the plane home more.”

The match, dubbed the Everest Test, was played at the 5,165-metre high Gorak Shep plateau, said to be one of the most inhospitable areas on earth. It was reached following a nine-day hike from the Nepalese town of Lukla. Kinsey was a member of Team Tenzing, which lost the match to Team Hillary by 36 runs.

“The nerves were jangling on match day and waking up with the usual altitude headache and dehydration certainly compounded the matter,” he said.

Hillary batted first, making 152 for five, with Tenzing all out for 116.

“Unfortunately I made just six runs which was mightily disappointing as you only get one shot at something like this.

“But the main thing was we completed the match and everyone was well on both sides, which was a tribute to the doctors.”

Kinsey, a farmer by profession, said boundaries were commonplace as running was so exhausting.

One of the highlights of the trip was his birthday evening, which saw the porters present him with a chocolate cake with his name on – a break from the regular diet of potatoes, rice and pasta.

But following the match, things started to go downhill in more ways than one.

“On the way back, people were going down with all sorts of illnesses and we were just glad to get back to normality,” he said.

Organisers hope £250,000 will be raised for the Lord’s Taverners children’s charity.

Kinsey would like to thank everyone who has donated, along with the Trekkit Mountain Sports shop in Hereford and staff at the gym in the Burton Hotel, Kington.

■ Kinsey will be holding trip presentations in the near future and asked any schools interested in booking him to email kjhern@hotmail.com.