Personally speaking: Charles Randall
Comments made recently by Richard Thompson, the Surrey chairman, about the role of "major" clubs seems to expose a wishful misapprehension.
Thompson has been a very good chairman for Surrey, and his drive to bring a"Surrey perspective" to the playing staff, as he put it in a BBC interview, is admirable, but his desire to work more closely with clubs is not the straightforward solution he might think.
Surrey sacked their coach Chris Adams in June and brought in Alec Stewart to help seek a replacement. Stewart, a former international and rock-solid Surrey man -- indeed his brother Neil played for Malden Wanderers CC -- is to direct a new policy of working more closely with clubs within the county rather than signing London-based foreigners or ageing professionals at the end of their careers. Jon Lewis and Zander de Bruyn, for example, were released this year at the age of 38.
Thompson emphasised that the new coach’s role would be to work more closely with the "major" club sides in Surrey. "For example, Wimbledon Cricket Club has won three titles in a row, but the last Surrey player they produced was Chris Bullen in 1982," he said. "Thirty years have gone by and the best club in Surrey is yet to produce a Surrey payer. We need to correct that and a lot of clubs need to understand that."
Anyone with long experience of club cricket would know that success in leagues and the production of players for professional county cricket are barely compatible. Wimbledon and similar powerful clubs nurture enormous youth sections, but they win games consistently because they have skilful players of maturity and not because they are packed with young guns seeking professional careers.
High talent is spread among the population at random - quite often sons or daughters of keen players - and it is natural that any club with youth systems might produce an exceptional player. Guildford provided Surrey with two wonderful servants to the game in Martin and Darren Bicknell; Cheam produced Mark Butcher and Alistair Brown. Middlesex benefited when Richard Johnson emerged from Sunbury -- a Surrey Championship club on the Middlesex border -- to graduate as an England seam bowler. Jason Roy, in the Surrey current side, hails
from Reigate Priory. There is no consistent thread.
Surrey made a startling revival in 1999 with three county championship titles in four years under Adam Hollioake. This side had the profile rightly sought by Thompson for 2014 onwards. Martin Bicknell finished as highest wicket-taker in 1999, and the leading batsman was Brown with 1,127 runs at 51.22. Add in Butcher, Stewart, Graham Thorpe and Ian Ward -- all boys from local club cricket. Even Adam and Ben Hollioake, raised in Australia, were closely identified with Surrey. The key signings from outside were Saqlain Mushtaq, at his peak as a Pakistan off-spinner, and leg-spinner Ian Salisbury, signed from Sussex. That point of this snapshot is to emphasise that a vintage county side had no connection with the strongest club at the time -- Wimbledon CC, Surrey champions in 1992, 95, 97 and 99.
It is not practicable or desirable, in my opinion, that highly promising youth players should be ushered into a few select clubs or even premier league outfits. Such disruption is only a theory, completely unproven, accepted without much thought by county coaches. These players should enjoy their weekends in familiar surroundings at least until university age before considering life in the professional game or premier leagues, and even then there is little point in forcing a change of clubs. After all, they usually play at club level only once a week and would probably spend more time with county second team cricket.
Counties such as Surrey should continue to offer expert coaching and identify players for representative cricket through the age groups, as they do now, and they should forget about social manipulation or focusing on any particular clubs. It is highly unlikely that playing for any club once a week in itself affects a player's ability in professional terms, though there is no harm in encouraging, rather than forcing, any young player to aspire to the highest standard of recreational cricket.
Ealing must be the club nearest to the model imagined by Thompson, as their consistent success in the Middlesex County League and major cup competitions is astounding. They owe much to Chris Peploe, the former Middlesex left-arm spinner and a formidable club all-rounder at the age of 32. Good promising players are emerging from this club, such as Harry Podmore, Ollie Wilkin and Robbie White, yet the current Middlesex first-team squad contains no Ealing product. Only Ned Eckersley, as a wicketkeeper-batsman at Leicestershire, has made his mark on the county circuit.
Thompson is right to imply that London, a vast connurbation, must have the right potential for talent. Clubs should certainly encourage as many youth players into the game as possible as part of the Club Cricket Conference mantra, but this responsibility applies to all, not just "major" clubs. And it is no surprise or unusual that a champion club such as Wimbledon does not produce players for county cricket.
Surrey have published perfectly sound thoughts on the player pathway and the qualities sought from would-be professionals, starting at the age of nine. They select for county age group teams, hoping that the best players will move on to elite programmes such as the Pemberton Greenish Academy and eventually perhaps to the staff.
Surrey define age-group representative players as "children and young cricketers with skills and attributes developed, or have the potential to develop, to a level significantly ahead of their age group within the county."
Surrey add detail to this definition of the qualities required. They say a generic profile of a talented county age group cricketer includes and is not exhausted by the fact that the players plays a number of sports, has good foundations of athletic abilities, has good core cricket skills, relishes competition, works hard, enjoys learning new skills and wants to develop and improve, is tactically astute and finds.
At club or schools level they say a likely player would consistently perform very well at school, club or district age group level, out-perform his peers and "take control and set the tone".
The primary concern of clubs, and the Club Cricket Conference, is to increase the number of players and keep them interested in the game. The high-flyers are directed to youth representative cricket. This is the system that will bring a "Surrey perspective" back to the Kia Oval.
Talking about taking control, Wimbledon continued to stamp their authority under Neil Turk by taking the Surrey Championship for a third successive year and by retaining the National Club Twenty20 title at a 'home' finals day at the Kia Oval. Unlike the sheer brilliance of their 2012 success at Edgbaston, Wimbledon needed only to win two indoor bowl-outs against Banbury and then Ormskirk when rain ruined the day, but they did well to reach that stage.
Wimbledon jostled with Weybridge through the summer for the Championship title, but Wimbledon finished the stronger with four wins out of four. They settled the issue on the last Saturday with an astonishing one-wicket home victory over Banstead when all seemed lost.
Thanks to 101 not out from Daniel Newton, Banstead made 197-7 off their 50 overs, with Sebastian Franke-Matthecka taking four wickets. The champions stuttered in reply and slipped to 136-8 and still needed 42 when last man Jack Snape joined Ben Compton at the crease. Compton finished on 75 not out as he ushered his side home with one ball to spare.
It so happened that Weybridge lost at Guildford by 48 runs on the same day and had to be content as runners-up. Their signing of Sarel Erwee as their overseas player, from Kwa-Zulu Natal, proved to be an inspired choice, because the left-hander hit 974 runs at an average of 64.93, including four successive hundreds, a league record. His contribution certainly boosted Weybridge's fortunes in 2013.
The most prolific batsman in the Surrey pyramid was Luke Reece, of Egham in Division Four. The club stormed to the title on the back of Reece's 1,077 runs at 89.75, including four hundreds and a 99, and his fellow opener David Risk hit 608 at 60.8.
Valley End, former national village champions, were promoted to the top division along with Ashtead, replacing bottom club East Molesey and Malden Wanderers.
Comments made recently by Richard Thompson, the Surrey chairman, about the role of "major" clubs seems to expose a wishful misapprehension.
Thompson has been a very good chairman for Surrey, and his drive to bring a"Surrey perspective" to the playing staff, as he put it in a BBC interview, is admirable, but his desire to work more closely with clubs is not the straightforward solution he might think.
Surrey sacked their coach Chris Adams in June and brought in Alec Stewart to help seek a replacement. Stewart, a former international and rock-solid Surrey man -- indeed his brother Neil played for Malden Wanderers CC -- is to direct a new policy of working more closely with clubs within the county rather than signing London-based foreigners or ageing professionals at the end of their careers. Jon Lewis and Zander de Bruyn, for example, were released this year at the age of 38.
Thompson emphasised that the new coach’s role would be to work more closely with the "major" club sides in Surrey. "For example, Wimbledon Cricket Club has won three titles in a row, but the last Surrey player they produced was Chris Bullen in 1982," he said. "Thirty years have gone by and the best club in Surrey is yet to produce a Surrey payer. We need to correct that and a lot of clubs need to understand that."
Anyone with long experience of club cricket would know that success in leagues and the production of players for professional county cricket are barely compatible. Wimbledon and similar powerful clubs nurture enormous youth sections, but they win games consistently because they have skilful players of maturity and not because they are packed with young guns seeking professional careers.
High talent is spread among the population at random - quite often sons or daughters of keen players - and it is natural that any club with youth systems might produce an exceptional player. Guildford provided Surrey with two wonderful servants to the game in Martin and Darren Bicknell; Cheam produced Mark Butcher and Alistair Brown. Middlesex benefited when Richard Johnson emerged from Sunbury -- a Surrey Championship club on the Middlesex border -- to graduate as an England seam bowler. Jason Roy, in the Surrey current side, hails
from Reigate Priory. There is no consistent thread.
Surrey made a startling revival in 1999 with three county championship titles in four years under Adam Hollioake. This side had the profile rightly sought by Thompson for 2014 onwards. Martin Bicknell finished as highest wicket-taker in 1999, and the leading batsman was Brown with 1,127 runs at 51.22. Add in Butcher, Stewart, Graham Thorpe and Ian Ward -- all boys from local club cricket. Even Adam and Ben Hollioake, raised in Australia, were closely identified with Surrey. The key signings from outside were Saqlain Mushtaq, at his peak as a Pakistan off-spinner, and leg-spinner Ian Salisbury, signed from Sussex. That point of this snapshot is to emphasise that a vintage county side had no connection with the strongest club at the time -- Wimbledon CC, Surrey champions in 1992, 95, 97 and 99.
It is not practicable or desirable, in my opinion, that highly promising youth players should be ushered into a few select clubs or even premier league outfits. Such disruption is only a theory, completely unproven, accepted without much thought by county coaches. These players should enjoy their weekends in familiar surroundings at least until university age before considering life in the professional game or premier leagues, and even then there is little point in forcing a change of clubs. After all, they usually play at club level only once a week and would probably spend more time with county second team cricket.
Counties such as Surrey should continue to offer expert coaching and identify players for representative cricket through the age groups, as they do now, and they should forget about social manipulation or focusing on any particular clubs. It is highly unlikely that playing for any club once a week in itself affects a player's ability in professional terms, though there is no harm in encouraging, rather than forcing, any young player to aspire to the highest standard of recreational cricket.
Ealing must be the club nearest to the model imagined by Thompson, as their consistent success in the Middlesex County League and major cup competitions is astounding. They owe much to Chris Peploe, the former Middlesex left-arm spinner and a formidable club all-rounder at the age of 32. Good promising players are emerging from this club, such as Harry Podmore, Ollie Wilkin and Robbie White, yet the current Middlesex first-team squad contains no Ealing product. Only Ned Eckersley, as a wicketkeeper-batsman at Leicestershire, has made his mark on the county circuit.
Thompson is right to imply that London, a vast connurbation, must have the right potential for talent. Clubs should certainly encourage as many youth players into the game as possible as part of the Club Cricket Conference mantra, but this responsibility applies to all, not just "major" clubs. And it is no surprise or unusual that a champion club such as Wimbledon does not produce players for county cricket.
Surrey have published perfectly sound thoughts on the player pathway and the qualities sought from would-be professionals, starting at the age of nine. They select for county age group teams, hoping that the best players will move on to elite programmes such as the Pemberton Greenish Academy and eventually perhaps to the staff.
Surrey define age-group representative players as "children and young cricketers with skills and attributes developed, or have the potential to develop, to a level significantly ahead of their age group within the county."
Surrey add detail to this definition of the qualities required. They say a generic profile of a talented county age group cricketer includes and is not exhausted by the fact that the players plays a number of sports, has good foundations of athletic abilities, has good core cricket skills, relishes competition, works hard, enjoys learning new skills and wants to develop and improve, is tactically astute and finds.
At club or schools level they say a likely player would consistently perform very well at school, club or district age group level, out-perform his peers and "take control and set the tone".
The primary concern of clubs, and the Club Cricket Conference, is to increase the number of players and keep them interested in the game. The high-flyers are directed to youth representative cricket. This is the system that will bring a "Surrey perspective" back to the Kia Oval.
Talking about taking control, Wimbledon continued to stamp their authority under Neil Turk by taking the Surrey Championship for a third successive year and by retaining the National Club Twenty20 title at a 'home' finals day at the Kia Oval. Unlike the sheer brilliance of their 2012 success at Edgbaston, Wimbledon needed only to win two indoor bowl-outs against Banbury and then Ormskirk when rain ruined the day, but they did well to reach that stage.
Wimbledon jostled with Weybridge through the summer for the Championship title, but Wimbledon finished the stronger with four wins out of four. They settled the issue on the last Saturday with an astonishing one-wicket home victory over Banstead when all seemed lost.
Thanks to 101 not out from Daniel Newton, Banstead made 197-7 off their 50 overs, with Sebastian Franke-Matthecka taking four wickets. The champions stuttered in reply and slipped to 136-8 and still needed 42 when last man Jack Snape joined Ben Compton at the crease. Compton finished on 75 not out as he ushered his side home with one ball to spare.
It so happened that Weybridge lost at Guildford by 48 runs on the same day and had to be content as runners-up. Their signing of Sarel Erwee as their overseas player, from Kwa-Zulu Natal, proved to be an inspired choice, because the left-hander hit 974 runs at an average of 64.93, including four successive hundreds, a league record. His contribution certainly boosted Weybridge's fortunes in 2013.
The most prolific batsman in the Surrey pyramid was Luke Reece, of Egham in Division Four. The club stormed to the title on the back of Reece's 1,077 runs at 89.75, including four hundreds and a 99, and his fellow opener David Risk hit 608 at 60.8.
Valley End, former national village champions, were promoted to the top division along with Ashtead, replacing bottom club East Molesey and Malden Wanderers.