Getting back to normal?
Staffordshire Cricket’s development director JASON BRITTON says it is all systems go for the new season...
FINGERS crossed for a return to some normality in 2022!
The past two years have been incredibly tough for everyone, but the resilience of our game, our leagues, clubs, players and our volunteers has been fantastic.
From embracing and working with the adaptations to get the game back on, to offering sites for immunisation centres and creating All Stars and Dynamos centres for the county’s young people to access, our game showed its true colours in the most adverse of circumstances.
Things have also been busy off the pitch. At our March 2021 annual meeting, members of Staffordshire Cricket unanimously supported the board’s proposal to seek charitable status and, after much time and effort, we became a charity in November.
The status provides the board with a number of opportunities to use the power of cricket to help impact on a broader social agenda, offering support around physical and mental well-being, social cohesion and supporting communities as well as continuing our core focus of club and player development.
Our first full operating year under the ECB’S County Partnerships Agreement was scrutinised by senior representatives from the national governing body at our review meeting last December.
Staffordshire was commended on the strength of the game and praised for a number of its activities
demonstrating best practice nationally.
The issues raised by Azeem Rafiq and others in the game have resonated up and down the country.
The work of the Independent Commission for Equity in Cricket continues to gather testimonials of those who feel they have been discriminated against in the game and an independent body has been collating and supporting complainants to ensure voices are heard.
In Staffordshire, we have long seen huge value in a varied and diverse board both in terms of skill-sets and demographics and our Diverse Communities sub-committee is focusing on equality, diversity and inclusion training and education as well as – through the Staffordshire Charter – supporting local cricket decision-making bodies to be more representative of the memberships they serve and our formal EDI plan will be available by the end of May.
At time of writing, our winter performance programmes are reaching their conclusion and indoor settings will soon be replaced by outdoor; our club support continues at a pace with the re-emergence of Clubmark and
National Programmes for junior players.
While already busy, the schools’ programme approaches its peak season and our new inclusion in the Lord’s Taverners’ Super 1s programme will see more dedicated focus on Ability Cricket in Staffordshire – more of which will be covered by our team’s articles.
We are hugely excited by the opportunities that the county’s Showcase fixture will bring when our county club takes on Leicestershire at Knypersley in July and planning is already under way for what promises to be a great day.