Forum

Interesting to read Roger Bell's comments about the number of teams playing in the league in 1976. He mentions the demise of several clubs including YMCA. I played all my cricket over many years at Bladon Drive until YMCA HQ, in their wisdom, decided to sell the ground for housing in the mid 1980's. We had at least 4 teams playing every week plus a team in the midweek league.
I had the pleasure, at one time or another, of captaining each of the teams and over the years YMCA had some very fine players. We had a lot of family members playing - maybe some of the players will bring back memories. We had the McCormick family, Sam senior, young Sam, Stewart and Billy. George Hill and son Geoffrey, Harry McAuley and sons Henry and Norman, Ian Gregg and son Terry, Brian Boyd and son Keith, Michael Perrott and son Stephen, the Yates brothers Roy and Alan, the Forshaw brothers Ken and Derek, and the Bamford brothers David and Charlie.
We had some fine players who worked in the Northern and Ulster Banks, Wilson Irvine, Roy Scott, Peter Lindsay, Jack Torney, Andy Jordan, Ken Torrens, Gwyn Hughes and Sam McConnell. Queens University members were David Jardine, Vasu Nayar, Arun Roy and Mohammed Timol. Some of the other players were George Orr, Norman Crawford, Raymond Doherty, Dennis Barrett, Jack Waring, Wilfie Chisholm, Billy Boat, Herbie Moore, Gavin Craig, Norman Patterson and Paul McIlfatrick. Apologies to those players I have forgotten.
Who will ever forget the grimace and scowl on the face of the fearsome Ted Gwynne as he came in to open the bowling !!

I bet that if some of the players I have mentioned were playing today they would give a lot of the current players in the various leagues a run for their money!!
Hope this evokes some memories of the good old days - if anyone remembers any of these past players let us have your stories.

RE 3rd XI cricketer.

You are forgetting the 2 new teams who have entered (Waringstown V and CIYMS IV). Division 3 will therefore have 41 teans, Sections 1-4 comprising 8 teams each, and the remaining 9 teams will form Section 5. It will therefore be possible for teams in all Sections in Division 3 to arrange to play each other at home and aeay in 2009.

the situation of clubs dropping teams is really much worse than is being discussed. Before the link-up of clubs Collegians, Cooke, North and Civil Service were fielding 4 sides each. I'm not suggesting that amalgamation was the reason but as in any other organisation, if the reasons for declining membership aren't addressed then joining up with others in a similar situation only postpones the evil day. We have clearly been in decline since te mid 80s to which Roger referred. A similar situation exists in club rugby and nothing has been done to address the issue so I'm not really all that optmistic that cricket will be all that different.

RE IVAN

Ivan you obviously are aware of what is going on in division 3 of NCU cricket - I have been looking at last seasons leagues and see Div 1 had 8 teams, Div 2 had 8 teams (inc folded Cooke 3rds), Div 3 had 8 teams, Div 4 had 8 teams (inc folded Lisburn 4ths and downpatrick 4ths)and Div 5 had 14 teams (inc folded Donaghadee, Inst, Templepatrick, and Portadown)

By my reckoning this means Division 3 now has a total of 39 teams for 2009 season. Has a decision been made by NCU over the restructuring of these leagues in light of the 7 teams having folded???

I look forward to someone hopefully answering this

Thanks

Gents
Don’t normally comment on forums but here goes…..

Just to give a bit of reasoning behind the Templepatrick CC decision not to field a 4th XI this year.
The main reason is due to ground work being done at Ballyclare High School therefore we will only have one ground available in 2009, as was the case this year and we found it hard to get matches slotted in.
We discussed playing more matches away but with our 3rd and 4th XI’s mostly made up with youth members, traveling to ALL of these would prove difficult. We therefore decided to try and run 3 teams well, rather than 4 with difficulty.
We will look to enter a 4th XI in 2010 with the school ground being available again.

We consider the development of our club a priority and although this is a step backwards for now, we feel our long term health is rosy. We would never wish to be complacent about this, and to stand still is to regress, so with the addition of five artificial all weather practice bays to be built pre-season we feel we offer a good product to the community

I have to agree with a lot of postings lately about high youth interest and considering the coaching we offer we are happy with this aspect of our club however adult numbers show room for improvement ………….a big issue across the board.

Regards
Andy

Everyone has hit the problem spot on. Guys stop playing on the 1sts and retire. How do we get more people who have gained so much from the game to put something back? How do we make cricket below 1sts cricket more appealing for both adults and kids?
Re Tom H. I don't remember passing the buck on any Forum. I thought I expressed views on the game not just from an individual club view. I was disgusted when at 5pm on the day of the AGM I discovered no one was attending the meeting. I personally couldn't get out of a prior engagement but I'm not an office bearer or committee member and had assumed that we were covered.
My only defence to this blinkered attack is that we as a club have fielded four teams regularily now for the past ten years or so and are striving to field a fifths. We also fielded a midweek league team last season made up almost entirely by guys who don't play Saturday's anymore.

Dearth of youth!
It does appear to be the case that it"s harder to keep the youngsters interested in playing Saturday cricket. I have to agree with the earlier poster that maybe this 2020 game will be a shot in the arm and help renew the fun factor.

My own club-Victoria,have an average player age:1st.team of 48yrs,2nd team a bit less; even our Pro will be 72yrs old if he"s up for it next season.

So as you can see we could definetly do with more young players coming in and sticking at the game!
Vic Jons

The problems that Michael described seem to be the case all across the Union and is certainly all too clear at most levels below 1st XI. The late 20's and 30 somethings just don't seem to be able to commit themselves through a summer which means that there is a bit of a generation gap with a few older guys helping out the teenagers who are keeping clubs going at the minute. Armagh are still keeping 4 teams in the NCU this season and would be the lowest ranked club in the Union (along with Larne) who can say this, but it will be interesting to see how they fare in 2009.

Stuart - you have hit the nail on the head and pretty much summarised why Belfast Harlequins did not work and CSN struggled for a few years. We had no players in their 20s and the a generation seemed to just stop playing as opposed to dropping down the ranks. Readdressing the problem is tough. Shorter game times seems to have been the answer given a lot.

With regard to debates on rules etc. My view would be simple. One new rule for 1st XI cricket. The captains of each team plus the development committee meet in January once fixtures are decided to agree the rules for the year ahead for each league. It would be hard year 1 but thereafter only the rules that were unpopular would be deleted or amended. Perhaps unrealistic but at least then players could not blame the NCU!!

Stuart has hit the nail on the head with his analysis of the problems in relation to numbers playing cricket. At Lisburn we too have plenty of youth members (well over 50) but the decline in our senior membership over the years is the problem. We have half a dozen or so playing members in the "around 40" bracket, and we have lost a couple of those this season. But that is not the problem either, because those guys have played more than 20 years cricket. Its the age group from early 20s to mid 30s that is our major problem. In the past we had always a healthy number in that demographic, now we are lucky to count them on the fingers of one hand. The young guys need to play with these sort of players so that they can be guided and the most enjoyable teams I have played on are the ones where 5 or 6 experienced guys blend with 5 or 6 young lads. This season our thirds suffered - most weeks it was one or 2 adults and 9 kids. Our 4ths was the same story, though its not all doom and gloom Ivan, as although our 4ths have pulled up stumps, they are rebranding as we are entering a midweek team for the first time in many seasons. The tension that exists is between the older guys who have been brought up with 50 over cricket and who enjoy it and want it to stay that way, and the young guys who would prefer 20 over ding dongs and be away by 4pm. That tension needs to be addressed and may require imaginative thought for it to be reconciled, as the kids need the adults, the adults need the kids, and the game of cricket needs both. Can we reconcile it. As Barack might say YES WE CAN, but it will take skill and leadership. We shall see if that exists as things progress.

Regarding Ivan McCombe's concerns -
So concerned that no-one from your club attended that AGM?
I await the "I'm not speaking for my club just myself" response so beloved by Forumites from east Belfast to Buckna.
Perhaps these people should speak TO their Club before solving the problems of the wider cricketing world.
"Why do you look at the speck that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?"

ivan/roger

loss of teams/cricketers is a worrying trend. would i be right in saying that only a few years ago cooke/collegians had 5 teams!?!? including inst that makes a reduction of 4 teams at shaws bridge in a very short period of time.

but i feel it is not the amount of kids is the problem, its the senior players. at derriaghy our youth membership is higher than ever but our adult membership seems to be reducing every year.
going back 15 or 20 years the trend seemed to be mostly adults playing with 2-3 kids in each teams, whereas now it is certainly the other way round, and its a struggle to find 3 adults sometimes.
it seems to be that older players are not filtering down the clubs as they used to, once 1st XI days are over they retire. on the other side, if the kids get to their late teens and realise they wont be regulars on 1st XI they stop playing, leaving a massive void in standards.

Roger
Your posting will make scary reading to cricket lovers.Three of the top clubs over the past 60 or so years namely Instonians,Lisburn and Downpatrick all fielding one team less in 2009,and another three in Portadown,Donaghadee and Cooke Collegians down to two Saturday teams.Clubs in that position can't really avoid much more erosion in playing members.Templepatrick dropping a team is equally worrying.They are recognized for having a large turnout at youth practices and probably have more NCU qualified coaches than any other NCU club.
Can someone at Waringstown tell us how they are bucking the trend?
Roger you have been a stalwart of Junior cricket administration for many years and have access to the statistics that show the decline in the number of Saturday teams and also the number of games completed.Having this highlighted might just let us see how much danger our sport is in.A table for each of the last 15 years might show us a worrying trend.
Any sport or business that has a steady fall off in participants or customers needs to address that decline or eventually go out of business.
Why when it is accepted that over the last ten years the number of youngsters being "coached " at clubs has dramatically increased are we not seeing more of these people wanting to play Saturday cricket when they turn into adults? Our product offering MUST be wrong.
I know from being involved at Muckamore with the 3rds and 4ths for the past six or seven years that the late starts and not getting home to eight o'clock is definitely a factor.
Whatever the reasons this trend has got to be addressed.I have said before that this is in my opinion as critical as sorting out the Premier League.If the trend is that we lose a net five teams was to continue for the next five years we will be in a scenario where clubs will go out of business.This is going to have far reaching effects as sponsors and government agencies won't want to be associated with a dying sport.
The work of the cricket development officers at youth level can't really be called in to question so we need to find out what stops the numbers carrying on to play adult cricket.The best people for a business ever to ask what they want is it's customers.We should be listening to the actual players at all levels.How about issuing a survey direct to every registered player in the NCU.
It's all ok having the Ireland teams winning at all levels but if the grassroots and games foundations aren't right this will come crashing in round us.I think a "STOP CRICKET DYING " poster campaign should be distributed to every club,sporting body,school,workplace.Let's make the product what people want and see if we can reverse the trend of falling numbers playing on a Saturday.Maybe on reflection that should be a positive message "MAKE FRIENDS FOR LIFE " "CRICKET IS FUN ".

Andy, I was having another look back, and numbers of teams would appear to have peaked around the mid-eighties. By the early 80's as you quite rightly say, Div 4 had been formed and by 1986 numbers were as follows: Div 1 42 teams, Div 2 39, Div 3 (4 Sections) 33, Div 4 (3 Sections) 24, TOTAL 138 teams. Numbers continued at around these levels until the late 90's but since then there has been a steady decline, mainly I suspect for the reasons you mentioned in your last submission! There is however a lot more youth cricket being played now than there was in those days, the problem appears to be keeping these kids playing into their adulthood.

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