Luton Core City Focus Group Meeting-Luton Town & Indians CC Tuesday 4th December 2018 @ 6pm
Present: Dave Summers/Brad Matthews/Chantal Hardy/Amran Malik Cricket East
Jenni Jordan ECB
Matthew Hudson Luton Borough Council
Ossie Lewis/Dudley Balone Luton Caribbean’s CC
Lucky Singh/Ashwin Kumar/Meeta Patel Luton Town & Indians CC
Apologies Received From:
Saeed Iqbal Hatters League
Asfan Javed/Councillor Aslam Khan Midweek League
Graham Simpson Team Beds & Luton
Helen Barnett Active Luton
Gulfraz Riaz National Asian Cricket Council
Uzayr Raja Big Bash
Rick Donnelly Luton Borough Council
Mohammed Arif/Matt Blakeley ECB
Dave Summers welcomed everyone to the meeting saying that its primary focus was to respond to a request made at the last meeting: To deliver a pre-Christmas update on the Luton Core City Project with a real emphasis on the 4 Working Groups local activities.
Facilities:
Jenni gave an overview on the large piece of work that was being undertaken with the ECB, Cricket East, Institute of Groundsman, Luton Borough Council and Team Beds & Luton colleagues regarding visits and pitch samples/inspections of current grounds across the Town and a report had been produced that the Working Group was considering.
A meeting was then held on 20th November where interested parties from across the whole cricket community were invited to give their views as part of this process, this included on the siting of a number of Non Turf Pitches(NTP,s) and a net practice facility which will it is hoped can be installed in the Town hopefully next Spring as part of the longer term solution and to ease pressures on the current grass squares. Further Working Group meetings were planned to add shape to progressing this insight and the pitch report recommendations.
The Working Group were also considering how grounds maintenance responsibilities could be managed moving forward including wider involvement of members of the whole Luton cricket community with appropriate support/training.
Points raised by those present included: need for safety considerations in grounds maintenance/Cost of playing cricket currently/Could Young Leaders have a future role to play-Training of Young leaders (14-16 years) was being planned for March/April next year.
Formats:
Amran talked through his presentation(slides accompanying these notes) on the range of formats being delivered weekly across the Town at all ages to develop a cricketing Pathway. 30 youngsters had attended the All Stars Mosque sessions. In the region of 130 youngsters 8-15 were attending the 5 Lords Taverners Wicketz Hubs. The Taverners had asked for work to be undertaken to explore longer term sustainability of the Hubs, meetings are planned to e.g. consider whether there is an appetite in the Town for sponsorship of any of these. Amran made particular reference to successes on these initiatives which included: opportunities for Wicketz youngsters to attend the National Repton Festival and International Matches at First Class County Grounds. Further, a number of youngsters from the project had successfully secured Bedfordshire County Age Group Winter Development Training opportunities and Chance to Shine Street attendees had represented the ECB u19 Luton City Cup Team with 2 of these individuals attending a MCC Young Cricketers development session at Lords.
Brad gave information on a bid that had been made to the Luton Airport Fund for cricket development support in Stopsley and Crawley Green areas of the Town, hopefully further news on this would be received early in the New Year.
Women & Girls:
Chantal referred to the Womens indoor sessions that started in September, over 20 ladies were on the register, 10 regular ladies attend the sessions. On Thursday 6th December a Boly-CricHit taster session will be held this join up music with exercise and then a cricket session. These have been hugely successful elsewhere nationally with the potential to see if there is an appetite for this in Luton. By popular demand, the indoor sessions will continue after Christmas, Thursday 6:00-7:30 at Denbigh until April. LTICC will host the ladies sessions during the summer.
Meeta described the impact that the Women’s Programme was having in the Town with further people interested in joining and that the sessions were providing time and space for the ladies to enjoy themselves.
The intention is to enter a team into the indoor league which starts in October 2019 and then the Ladies 4 county league in April 2020.
Across Luton currently girl’s sessions are held at: Denbigh and Icknield High Schools. In 2019 sessions will be held again at: Denbigh and Icknield High along with a further one starting at Luton 6th Form. St Matthews Primary School girl’s sessions will continue due to their enthusiasm to be part of the cricket landscape of the Town.
Workforce:
Brad and Dave talked about the dedicated Luton L2 Coach Education Course which was half way through. These Coaches it is hoped would support the developing Programmes in the Town and had 2 female Candidates on it.
There was a slight resentment evidenced from those present towards coaching courses in Bedfordshire always been hosted in Bedford. Brad highlighted to the group, that if the appetite and demand was there, more bespoke Luton coaching courses could be run for club members or wider Luton community. This depends on demand, cost and availability. But no reason this can’t happen if the will is there.
A dedicated Luton Stage 1 Umpires Course has been planned with the Association of Cricket Officials and will take place on Sunday 17th February 2019, Leagues and Clubs in the Town have been approached and encouraged to select the right candidates who can be part of supporting the development of Formats of cricket across the Town.
In partnership with Institute of Groundsman, Spring and Autumn 2019 dedicated Luton L1 Courses are under development currently to hopefully support the previously mentioned Facilities activity.
All of these Workforce initiatives are being supported by funding from the ECB Luton Core Cities Programme.
AOB:
Discussions included ensuring that there could be easier access to facilities in the Town.
Everyone was thanked for their contributions and attendance at the evening which closed around 8.10pm. Town & Indians CC were thanked for their excellent hospitality.
A further Focus Group Meeting would look to be arranged prior to the start of the 2019 season and it is hoped to run a further Working Groups insight development session in the first few months of the New Year involving other Club and League nominations.
Dave Summers Dec 2018