Murton Cricket Club

1.

**Murton CC Update - Sept 2021**

To all Members, players and Supporters

As advised earlier this week we have met with the Welfare Association to discuss the future operations of the cricket pavilion.

I am very pleased to say that the cricket pavilion and Bar will be reopened from this Saturday 4th September for the 2nd Team’s final home game of the season and also next Saturday 11th September’s 1st team final home game of the season.

From Friday 10th September, the pavilion and bar will also be reopened on Friday evenings, as per pre-COVID, arrangements for the cricket club members, supporters and general community.

The reopening of the pavilion and bar is vital to the cricket club as it enables us to recommence fund raising activities, such as our weekly quiz and letter draw and we ask that all club members, players and supports come and join us the final two home games of the season and continue to come and support on Friday evenings to help support the Cricket Club throughout the year.

In our meeting we also discussed the running of the pavilion and the option of renting/leasing the pavilion back to the cricket club to operate. Due to rules and regulations in regards to how the Welfare Association Charity is setup and rules and regulations in regards to the Charity Commissions, they are unable to do this. The Welfare Association Committee advised that they are fully happy to explain to any member who would like request a meeting with or who would like to write to them to explain these rules and regulations.  

I appreciate to some members that the Welfare being unable to hand the pavilion back to the Cricket club to run at this time is disappointing and you feel that this will still be a negative impact on the cricket club. However on review even if it was possible for the welfare to hand the pavilion back to the club, there would be significant financial impacts on the Cricket Club. As part of any process to hand the pavilion to the club, rules and regulations would stipulate tupe of staff from welfare to the cricket club, so there would be a financial impact of staff wages, whereas in past the old club was run purely by volunteers. On top of this there would be the obvious costs of running the facility, electricity, gas, increased insurance costs, television/sky sports costs, licence costs, brewery costs, etc which currently the club does not account for which needs to be considered.

However despite the Welfare not being able to hand the Pavilion back to the Cricket club, the Welfare have pledged to help and support the Cricket Club moving forward. After recent Welfare AGM and a new welfare committee being formed, we will be having regular meetings with the welfare to discuss support and ways forward for the Cricket Club. We have raised concerns regarding the state of, performance and safety of the wicket square and wickets which has been highlighted over the past several seasons by teams home and away and the Welfare have pledged to take this to the Parish Council and ground staff to review and see what can be done to resolve and improve them prior to the commencement of next season.

The Welfare have also pledged to help with and support along with the Parish Council, with any grant applications that the club may apply for. One of which the Welfare and Parish Council have given their full support to and will help the club with is, an application bid for funding to build and install new permanent net facilities at the club, which will be of a huge significant importance to the development of the club both junior and senior level and will put us on par of providing the same training facilities as other clubs in the area.

The Cricket club for years has been reliant on and has been ran purely by volunteers, lately of which unfortunately in these past few years has been very small in numbers. It has been very difficult on those volunteers as well due to the fact that all work full time. This last week has shown that there is a great deal of support to the Cricket Club and I ask that that support is continued to be given to the cricket club in that people come and visit the club, support us on match days and Friday evenings moving forward. With the relaxation of COVID restrictions and life slowly getting back to some normality the club will be looking to recommence functions and fund raising activities, which I ask for help and more volunteers from our supporters to help and assist the committee in organising and running these functions. We have spent a great deal of time and effort in redeveloping our Junior setup and formation of our Junior Academy in recent years but however again at present we have just a very small number of volunteers running our Junior setup and we need more volunteers from our Supporters to help our current Junior coaches and coaching assistants with the running of our junior teams and support to the club in the likes of running our Tuck shop that raises substantial funds for our club. I ask that our supporters contact us if they are willing and able to volunteer to help us.

If any wishes to discuss any of the comments above or discuss further, please contact me.

Regards and thank you for your continued support.

Ian Graham

Chairman

Murton CC

2.

**NEW SPONSORSHIP**

Murton CC are happy to announce that we have a new sponsor for 2021:

Essential Training & Consultancy Solutions

The ETCS Logo will be printed on our White playing Shirts. Available from our club shop on: Lorimers Sports Website.

3.

**2021 Sponsorship - JS Power Services Limited**

Murton CC wishes to thank James Smith of JS Power Services limited for his kind donation of Sponsorship to the club for 2021.

4.

**2021 Matchball Sponsorship**

Murton CC wishes to thank all members and supporters of the club that has sponsored a Senior game matchball for 2021. There are still some 3rd team games to sponsor, if you are interested please contact Ian Graham or Philip Grimwood. All sponsors can be viewed by clicking on here .

5.

**Murton CC 2021 Fixtures**

Murton CC - 2021 Fixtures are now available. Please click on link above to view or visit our Murton CC Play Cricket Website

6.

**ALLSTARS CRICKET RETURNS**

Murton CC is running its successful Allstars cricket programme again for 2021. The program will run on a Friday evening from 4:45pm till 5:45pm commencing 21st May for 8 Weeks. Visit the Allstars Website for further information and to register.

7.

**Junior Training - UPDATED**

Junior outdoor training will run Friday evenings: 6pm till 7:15pm all age groups

8.

**Murton CC 2021 Update**

Due to the recently announced government roadmap to lockdown restrictions being lifted, we are pleased to announce that we hope to have a full cricket season ahead of us for 2021. However unfortunately for the start of the season, atleast for the moment, the restrictions around the pavilion and the use of the changing rooms and bar facilities will remain in place as they were for the short cricket season we had last year. Unfortunately the bar will be closed until further relaxation of COVID rules apply later in the summer and due to COVID spacing the changing rooms will not be able to be used. The changing block will be open for toilet and first aid purposes only. Areas of the ground will be marked out for home and away teams. Again we ask all members to abide by COVID rules in terms of mask wearing, maintaining social distancing, use of hand sanitisers and disinfectant wipes at entrances and toilet facilities. There will be a logbook and a NHS Test & Trace app for all visitors to the ground to log there visit to enable the club and any authority to contact players/visitors should the need arise.

9.

** 2021 Volunteers **

Continuing to run the club is becoming increasing difficult due to the current COVID climate and also the personal and work demands on the current Club Committee, Junior Coaches. We are in need of additional volunteers to help and assist the club committee, particularly with support to our Junior Section. If anyone is will to volunteer, please contact Ian Graham or Anthony Potts.