Indoor Training
I have arranged some indoor coaching starting in March next year to take us up to the outdoor season.
This will be weekly on Sundays from 4-5pm for 6 weeks at Battle Sports Centre, Claverham and will follow the pattern of
two weeks of soft-ball training followed by a week of hard-ball training. I would
still like all players to attend the softball training even if they only intend
to play hard-ball cricket next season. The dates are as follows:
- Sunday 2nd March - Soft-ball
- Sunday 9th March - Soft-ball
- Sunday 16th March - Hard-ball
- Sunday 23rd March - Soft-ball
- Sunday 30th March - Soft-ball
- Sunday 6th April - Hard-ball
I am also aware that negotiations
are currently going on to begin coaching at Catsfield Primary school once more
early next year. Due to my current job the chances are that it won’t be myself
that runs this however the coaching is a result of the village’s colts section
being set-up and is something that I have requested as I believe it is
important to maintain the current school-club link. So please go along if it is
offered as it helps maintain this free coaching for the following years – I
will also be trying to pop along as and when I can.
Sponsorship Money & Hard-ball Equipment
Thank you to everyone that
sponsored me to run the Battle 10k earlier this year. The money was raised for our colt section and has been used to buy a box of cricket balls, a
cricket bat and a one complete set of hard-ball protective equipment including a
helmet, batting gloves, wicket keeper gloves, batting pads and wicket keeper
pads. I am aware that most of you would prefer that the club provided this protective equipment and as a result I also plan to apply for a Lord's Taverners set but must wait until April to do this.
Next Season
As it stands, I am only entering an U-12 hard-ball team into the league next season. My initial aim was
to enter both a hardball and softball team but, given our current squad size, I thought it unfair to ask a large
proportion of participants to attend two matches and one training session every
week when the season gets under-way. This would also be a lot of work for me to
organise, administer and attend on my own.
The long term plan is to firstly,
gain more players this year through both the club’s training and Chance to
Shine training at local schools and secondly, ‘recruit’ some volunteers to act as team
managers, umpires, scorers etc. for the additional teams that we generate. I
know many of you have been more than happy to help with this already so
hopefully this will continue and become part of the club’s ethos.
Merry Christmas to you all and I look forward to seeing you again in the new year.