Kent Cricket’s One Day, One Game at Beckenham
Monday 9th March 2015
More than 100 cricketers, scorers, coaches and officials attended the new-look County Ground, Beckenham on Saturday to celebrate their input and share tips and new ideas on growing the game.
Workshops on coaching, officiating and groundskeeping were all held in the new facilities at the indoor cricket school which boasts enough space for five net lanes.
Former Kent and England spinner Min Patel ran a fielding session and Bexley District Cricket coach Richard O'Sullivan focussed on throwing and catching drills in small spaces.
The Groundsmen Association and the ECB ran workshops including Jason Carr of JGC Sports Turf presenting his findings from the reconstruction of the square at Gravesend Cricket Club using different loams and Chris Woods from the ECB on new resources to improve pitch preparation and maintenance.
John Wright, business support manager for the ECB gave an insight into how clubs can make sure that clubs don’t lose revenue to bad weather and Staplehurst Cricket Club’s John Swannick shared some ideas on club development.
Paul Daniels from Cricket4Bromley presented details of the Young Leaders in Cricket programme that teaches young people the skills to coach and officiate as well as rewarding young people for doing 20 hours of volunteering for their club.
Errol Valentine of the Shepherd Neame Kent Cricket League also outlined the benefits of using the ECB’s Play Cricket website to collate statistics and how clubs can make it work for them.
Umpires and scorers were given guides to course and a demonstration of the Total Cricket Scorer by Andy Lynch from Kent Association of Cricket Officials (ACO).
The event also allowed visitors a look at the newly-built indoor cricket centre and a new 2,000-seater stand will be in place for the 2015 season as Kent returns to Beckenham after a two-year absence.
Kent will play three matches at the County Ground this season. Beckenham will host two games against local rivals Surrey in one LV= County Championship match and one NatWest T20 Blast as well as playing against Gloucestershire in another Friday night NatWest T20 Blast fixture.
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