Teams and Clubs

Teams and clubs you've got to have then - but what a soul destroying demoralising job it is to run them. I had a series of emails from my mate Xan and his brother Boffa saying that I was mad trying to run a cricket club reiterating their own sorry stories. But I've been there before I ran our scooter club back in 1983-84 and that was the same and later in life as treasurer of the Plymouth College or Art & Design student union 1991 - 1993 it was a similar story. So I wasn't too surprised this week when an email circulated around my new cricket club (I'm only a player/member) saying that in the last 5 years or so they estimated that they'd been short changed in unpaid membership fees somewhere in the region of £10,000 - £15,000! Gutted! The email went on to point out that the money was enough to refurbish/renew our pitch and that some of the people that continuously moan about the state of the pitch are the people short on their committment to the club e.g. haven't paid their members fees.

Apparently the situation is so bad that it's threatening the existence of the club itself. I hope that those that haven't paid get their shit together and pay their dues because it's so obvious to me that there is a lot of people in the club who's lives are dedicated to it and revolve round it. For those people the situation they're faced with at the moment must be devastating.

As a new bloke and not being that sociable a person - I like what I've seen of the club despite the location of it and I like the people involve. I kind of get the feeling that for some people it's their whole life, but they're prepared to let you be involved on a surface level and allow you your own space. I looked at a lot of clubs in the area and some of them seem to be populated with total idiots. Maybe it's because these are people from my own town and the types of people I grew up with and I just fit in with them?

It's a shame that our cricket pitch is on the edge of a big estate and no-one in the area respects the pitch and the council seemingly don't spend a lot of money on maintaining it. Whereas were I live - the pitches are amazing and surrounded by beautiful trees and parks and are maintained by dedicated park keepers and the locals respect the wicket and the fence around it is left intact all year. But the impression I've had of the people in the clubs locally are that they're different. My wife says it's middle class, whereas my new club is very much made up of seemingly working class people.