thatcham
starting at 10.00am, and the final at approximately 6.00pm,
followed by entertainment in the evening.”
Youth
“Youth cricket is very important to our club, and in fact we
currently have more colts as members than senior players. We
currently have seven colts teams, at Under 9, Under 11 (2 teams),
Under 13, Under 15 (2 teams) and a girls team.
One of our colt’s coaches has been involved in coaching and
managing colts for approximately 15 years, and in this time has
seen may players develop from colts into senior cricket.
We now have the model of having managers and coaches for
each of our colts teams, including our girls team, which means the
coaches can spend their time being a coach, whilst the manager is
able to concentrate on the admin side i.e. team selection, sorting
out lifts to away games, ensuring everyone’s safety, teas etc. This
is a model that works very well, and is why we continue to attract
new colts players, whilst other teams in the area are struggling for
new colts, or closing their colts section.”
Community
“We are a community club. We have been involved with local
schools via the ECB Chance to Shine programme, with which one
of our senior players was heavily involved with coaching. We
have an excellent relationship with local government, both at the
town council and district council level.
We are engaged with other sporting clubs in Thatcham through
a council led sports network, and in Berkshire via Get Berkshire
Active – both of these are forums whereby we can engage with
other sports clubs outside of cricket to share best practice, exchange
ideas and replicate what’s worked well for other clubs.”
Challenges
“The biggest challenge we have, as do most clubs, is having
enough adult players. We currently have four Saturday teams and
one Sunday team, and the problem is not only numbers for each
of these teams, but finding the right balance between adult players
and colts, and also what standard to aim at.
We are fortunate to have a large number of colts players, but
some of these will move away from the area, or move away from
the game, or go to university, or get Saturday jobs etc. and the
challenge is to then maintain the interest in playing cricket of these
colts who do develop into senior cricket and want to continue
playing.
I know that keeping players interested in cricket, or getting
them started in cricket, is an issue that both the ECB and Thames
Valley League are looking at, so it may mean in the future we
perhaps move from 100 over games, with the current points
scoring system, to 40 overs per side, win or lose, along with a
reduction in the distances teams have to travel, which also has an
impact.
As an example, our 3rd XI team this session has three away
games to teams in West London, which means round trips of over
100 miles, and to be honest, there are people who don’t want to
give up their whole day for games like this.”
Ambitions
“We have a number of ambitions:
• For our 1ST XI to be back in Division 1 of the Thames Valley
League, after two seasons of consecutive relegation.
• For our other Saturday teams to be playing at the highest level
possible.
• Our real long term aim is to have a new club house, and changing
facilities, but this is all subject to gaining sufficient financial
backing for this.”
Lesley A Clay
Solicitor
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RG7 6TE
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