The Willows Cricket Club has provided significant opportunities for young cricketers over many years. This includes the opportunity to play at our ground in Loburn.
Each year 25 girls and boys school 1st XIs play at The Willows. These schools stretch from Whanganui in the north to Southland, and all regions in between. This amounts to some 300 secondary school-aged cricketers playing at The Willows each season. In addition, the club has provided the opportunity for many young cricketers to tour Sri Lanka, India, and other countries.
Our focus is now to provide more cricketing opportunities to boys and girls within our own communities, to ensure that cricket-loving secondary students are given the opportunity play and be coached. In particular, we want to provide cricket coaching where cost is a barrier to participation and allow access to cricket opportunities for boys and girls whose families may not be able to afford it.
Our programmes
The core of our coaching programmes is the ability to offer cricket coaching at no cost to participants. Cost is a barrier to entry for many young people. The Willows seeks to contribute by establishing a credible and ongoing coaching programme, and structures in the community that help young people get into sport, stay in sport, build self-esteem, teamwork and be part of a community.
The objective of our programmes is to encourage inclusivity and focus on providing a fun and safe environment. The Willows will be focussing on school community-based programmes that provide opportunities for players to thrive.
Funding
The Willows funds its coaching programmes from a number of sources including:
- Donations to the club
- Fundraising activities such as our Golf Day
- Trust Grant Funding, Rata Foundation, Mainland Trust, Queen Steet Cricket Club
(1) Tamai Sports & The Willows
- Partnership with Tamai Sports to provide cricket to boys and girls aged 8-11. This includes transport, pre-training snacks, post-training light meal and playing uniforms
- Programme to run weekly during Terms 4 and 1
- Qualified junior coaches will deliver the programme (police-vetted)
- Get the young cricketers to a standard whereby they can play in a competitive match
- Align young players with clubs for future seasons – once they reach secondary school
- Provide support for families and children so cost to play is not a barrier
- Build confidence in these young people
The programme is essentially to provide cricket for children who would not ordinarily get the opportunity to play in a structured cricket environment.
(2) Secondary schools cricket coaching programme
The Willows works with selected schools within the Canterbury region to provide cricket programmes for year 9-13 students. Specifically, we work with schools to enhance their cricket programmes, particularly at year 9-10 level to ensure players are getting coaching support and want to continue playing the game.
The Willows is funding coaches and resources at specific schools. This equates to six hours coaching time per week. The primary aims for the coaches are:
- Coaching in the skills of the game
- Providing structure and consistency to training sessions.
- Specialist coaching sessions, eg. batting, fast bowling, spin bowing, wicketkeeping
(3) Future ambitions
The club has future ambitions to establish an academy for boy and girl cricketers. The Willows Cricket Academy will pick up the more talented and promising players in our community and provide them with additional specialist coaching.
Not all the players selected for the academy will necessarily be at representative level but have the ability with application and good coaching to progress to this level. Players who are currently at representative level will also be included. The academy will give The Willows the ability to work with these players and continue to grow them as players and keep them connected to the cllub.
As complex as cricket can be, it is a sport that all can play – you simply need a bat and ball and the support for our young people to have the opportunity to participate and be part of a community.