The event has come about as consequence of David Gane telling me many years ago about Cheadle CC doing this sort of thing. So over a beer with Jonny Lee at Christmas decided it was a really good idea to hang the event loosely on the fact that it is 15 years (2001) since the Didsbury CC 1st team became the first in Cheshire to do the treble of CCCL winners, CCCL cup winners and Cheshire Cup winners.
In the 15 years since we did the treble in 2001 we have established an additional 2 senior mens teams which means we run 3 teams on a Saturday and 2 teams on a Sunday and there is every chance that we will start a 6th team in 2017 by forming an Academy side of primarily 13 to 15 year olds with some senior help from non-competitive adults to play some friendly matches on Sundays. Also, and amazingly we now have a very successful women’s section which has been established for 5 years and plays within the Cheshire Women’s Cricket League competition and have won a trophy in 4 out of those 5 seasons. We have been so successful that in 2016 we have been the only Women’s club in Lancashire or Cheshire to run 2 teams and we had our first women’s overseas player. In 2016 we also started a Girls Academy targeting girls aged from 6 to 12 who want to get into cricket – this is called The Didsbury Diamonds and in its first year we regularly had 16 girls attending and were able to start playing in some small tournaments.
73 adult men
31 adult women
125 juniors
As a consequence of our relatively high participation numbers we have been pretty successful as an overall club. Including the treble in 2001 we have actually won 27 trophies for winning leagues or cups in 15 seasons which is pretty amazing as we see it. Apart from 2001 the outstanding seasons have been 2008 when 1st/2nd and 3rd team all won their respective divisions and then this season - 2016 when 1st, 3rd and 4th teams won their respective leagues and our women’s 1st team won the 20/20 cup.
The 27 wins are made up as follows:
1st team – 5
2nd team – 4
3rd team – 10
4th team – 2
5th team – 1
Women – 4
Aggregate Trophy in 2008 – 1
So you can see that we continue to thrive as a recreational cricket club but we all need to be cognisant of difficulties facing sports clubs as we move forward. Clubs need volunteers, participants and cash to survive and all these will become much more difficult to come by.
Back to this evening:
We have managed to round up around 50 people for tonight through various methods and it is great to see so many partners here as well. Hope you enjoying the Prosecco.
We’ve had formal apologies from a few:
Jim McCall, Mark Slater, Tony DeWeever, Phil Prince and Trevor York. Also a number of people who were contacted but felt unable to respond either negatively or positively. Also sad to report that Steve Barlow a player with us in the 80’s died a couple of weeks ago in Essex and it is his funeral next Wednesday (23rd).
We have 11 of the 2001 squad which is great considering we know 4 are living in Australia or Pakistan. Particularly good to see Haran and his wife who have travelled from Essex.
Also, just to pick out a few of the other attendees
Welcome after more than 15 years to Roy Wilson who was certainly the best slow bowler the club has ever had and he is happy to tell you that he took more than 2000 wickets for us – astonishing and something that will not be repeated.
Also, we were expecting the father of an Olympic Gold medallist – how proud must Walshy feel? Can we get a blue plaque John?
Also those who have travelled a distance like John Morton and Nige Lord and also Keith Gentry who put himself out to get Roy here.
Enough of me as the whole idea of this evening is for people to catch up with people they may not have seen for a long time. We are open until late, so please enjoy the reunion, have a drink and eat Sam’s food.
Finally a toast to Didsbury cricket Club and future success.