Tony Clifton wrote:From another perspective, are community clubs set up to cater for a team of friends who want to play?
Or do players have to fit into the club structure where players might be picked in the A's, B's or C's in any particular week, depending on their ability and performance?
It is notable that a lot of these new teams are made up of cricketers recently arrived from overseas. Do they not feel comfortable walking into an existing, established cricket club for a game? If not, why? And what can be done to improve that situation?
I agree with your broad point that these 'pop up' clubs are not the best thing for the overall health of cricket, though acknowledge that it's good to see people playing (in any team).
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This 100%
Without having the stats in front of me its seems a very high majority of the new parkland style teams are based around the countries new arrivals.
I don't have a clue how 'club' cricket works overseas but is our system somewhat unique, is club cricket a structure other countries have. Is there a cultural difference between being able to go and play with 100% of your mates/family compared to a community structure where you are 'put' in a team based on skill and ability.
I agree, are we making new arrivals feel welcome enough. Being in the country at the moment its fair to say we don't see the same number of new arrivals in the region. When i was last playing city cricket very very very casual racism still existed. Very minor things like saying to the Indian bloke, 'we cant have our club curry night now because you will win it every year'.
Also and once again being very stereotypical but alot of our new arrivals work in the hospitality industry, I imagine this makes things such as training fairly difficult, in a community club structure each club has its own ways of dealing with non trainers etc. Do community clubs do enough to try and cater training for the needs of the players or are we all too locked in to Tuesday and Thursday night at 5:30pm? Back when I was living in the city it was not uncommon to see groups of what appeared to be new arrivals at the nets during non traditional hours like mid morning etc.
I honestly don't have the answers but i do agree that there is a lot of potential risk in every second old mate trying to and being able to set up their own club at the expense of the community clubs. Even listening to some blokes at my old city club i know their enjoyment was wavering due to a large amount of games played at grounds with limited amenities including toilets, canteen/kiosk, air conditioned club rooms etc. The same risk exists though when you get a group of glory hunters who want to come as a package and form their own superstar D Grade under your clubs banner. I've seen then end disastrously on many occasions as will.
From what ive seen as well a lot of those pop up clubs can be some the hardest for leagues to manage. Some last 10 years others quit mid season, they seem to be more of a year to year propositon, they also don't seem to be willing to meet the league requirements surrounding grade as well as community clubs, they don't tend to have the picture view that most community clubs have.
Don't really have the answer but yeah those pop up clubs don't really sit comfortable with me.