GAP IN CLASS EXPOSED BY NEW TOWN HUMILIATION

ALL out 27 ... and if you ever wondered what a cross-sport comparison would look like from how large the gap is between a cyclist climbing the Pyrenees, who has an injection of EPO running through their body, and a cyclist who does not, you need look no further than all out 27 chasing 241.

New Town, owner of 27 all out, have no injection of EPO in their system.

Lindisfarne, on Saturday, well they had at least 4ml of Tasmanian Tiger-shaped performance enhancers. And oh my, what a difference they make.

So please, grant me my outrageously stretched drugs simile, and let’s continue.

Of most concern to the Cricket Tasmanian Premier League right now, and perhaps the past decade, is the talent gap between its very best and the three that will compile its very worst. New Town, all out 27 — no current state squad members and one former (Ryan Lees). Glenorchy, zero wins, a long-time blacklist from the recruitment process (sorry guys, that’s my bad!). And from what I’ve observed so far, that win might remain elusive for a while.

In previous years, whenever the Tigers have recruited an interstate player to its contract list, the clubs have had to apply for the services of those chaps through a process that would ultimately decide what was best for the player, with an eye towards ensuring the bottom teams would receive a top-up of leadership and playing power so the competition continually rolled in an equal and fair manner.

Sadly, that whole concept of equality never got off the ground, with a pool of state players spread across five.

As of right now, the players recruited to the state — Sandhu, Neil-Smith — are free to make their own decision on which club they will represent. It’s a new thing. Fair work and harmony and all that.

CT’s involvement was in the facilitation of meetings for ALL the clubs to sell themselves directly to the players, as opposed having to sit in front of Andrew Dykes to plead with him not to send another one to Clarence or SHSB. Clubs would turn up to their scheduled player meeting having spent all-nighters on the PowerPoint presentation sales pitch, and some, were told NO without adjusting their chair to a comfortable position.

Neil-Smith chose to put his own development on hold so he could play behind Sam Rainbird and Riley Meredith as a second-change bowler. It’s a bad plan. You want to make a name for yourself, you put yourself in the Mark Divin position where you can the bowling, bat at six, field where you want, be a leader, call the shots, take the keeping gloves if you’re bored.

That gap I mentioned earlier, the one that will see New Town and Glenorchy make up the bottom three clubs, that doesn’t come through the lack of development structure at those clubs. It doesn’t come through a lack of effort to recruitment. It is not a result of an underperforming coaching crew, an inefficient board or poor playing/training facilities.

It comes simply as a result of the lack of talent being injected into those clubs by way of CT’s processes past and new.

How is it possible that New Town or Glenorchy can convince a player from next year’s pool of recruited talent to play at their club when they have not one person selling the club at squad training, second XI games or on the road with the team chatting to disgruntled members of other states? Not helping the Townies is that they are actually leaking the talent CT once injected into them with Andrew Fekete and Big Pads Hancock leaving the state for Victoria. And because social acceptance of squad life far outweighs loyalty in the cricket world, Aaron Summers departed for a second-change bowling gig at Lindisfarne. Bizarre. From this, both clubs are left in a raging hole. I’ve been there.

You can try and recruit guys from other clubs, kids from other regions and men from other states, but unless you’ve got a name player to sell, a name player selling on your behalf or an enormous pool of cash, you’ve got not hope.

The gap last week was large, but what happens when New Town take on South Hobart or Clarence at full strength? Well, it gets uglier than the fall of Lance Armstrong.