Bowling Old Lane: Disability champions and Curry Club

Bowling Old Lane Cricket Club is full of surprises – and that won’t be the last time I think that on my visit to BD5.

Situated off Birch Lane, the Bradford Premier League outfit have a story to tell beyond the long history of this proud community club who joined the league in 1915 and immediately won the double.

From Mohammed Yousuf to Darren Gough, Bowling Old Lane has its pedigree but beyond senior league cricket at a weekend lies a depth of initiatives that deserve attention. To me at least, its present and future are what have drawn me to this part of the city.

That and the dahl curry by Chair Naz Ali and served by Kammy outside while the visually impaired game between Bradford VICC and Yorkshire Vikings erupts into laughter and occasionally mild controversy.

Kammy is first-team captain and winner of May’s Yorkshire Tea Community Cricket Award. The first job is to photograph him with a box of Yorkshire Gold next to the Bowling Old Lane street sign.

As an aside, it’s a ground with plenty of love and attention in evidence from painted white walls to the planting of fruit trees, as well as a rose bush to remember a friend of the club who is longer alive.

With a steaming mug of tea each, we head into the back office of this community hub to discuss a range of topics from women an girls’ cricket to the emphasis Bowling Old Lane has on disability cricket as well as Over 50s, key personnel at the club and an amazing initiative called the Yorkshire Curry Club.

Micro-volunteering

We discuss the philosophy of what I’m terming micro-volunteering. Rather than having to commit for a day, Kammy advocates a bite-sized approach of an hour a week: “I always say that we need about ten people here and they don’t have to all be here all the time as cricket’s such a long game.”

With 30-40 different volunteers who’ve supported this year at Bowling Old Lane, it’s a flexible way to get those many jobs done that perhaps doesn’t make it so daunting for prospective helpers.

Of course, I’m sure he’d welcome any stalwarts with lots of time to give to take the pressure off!

Women and girls’ cricket

This sounds as if it was an organic move towards having a team rather than a deliberate focus for the Bowling Old Lane committee. Instead, more women attending and being around the club led that way.

Kammy tells me: “It’s been a concerted effort and a conscious effort from all of us that actually the club needs to expand from being a male-dominated environment. Over the last 12, 18 months, we have found that many more women are feeling comfortable to come here.”

A social group began to play and gradually that led to a desire to take part in indoor cricket and they came fourth in the Division 2 Bradford softball league over winter.

Grey Foxes

Captained by Chair Naz Ali, Bowling Old Lane are a force to be reckoned with in over 50s cricket. This year’s Grey Fox Trophy competition saw them sweep aside the ‘Over the Hillers’ (Windhill & Daisy Hill) by 133 runs with an away game at Rainton in Group 2 to follow on Sunday 29 June.

Kammy lights up when he talks about the Over 50s: “It’s one of the proudest things for me. Not Just because they win a lot, which they do and they’ve got a really good side. But as someone who’s grown up in the club, I’ve seen those guys as my mentors, leaders and coaches and people I’ve looked up to.”

Apparently, Bowling Old Lane have the 1884 Club; a monthly fundraising initiative to ensure there’s a kitty to cater for unexpected eventualities like machinery maintenance and all of the Over 50s put into that to help financially as well as the commitment on the field.

Yorkshire Curry Club

Based at Bowling Old Lane, the Yorkshire Curry Club is, as Kammy puts it, an “informal group of friends who come together to cook curries.” The idea being that they are sold to patrons within their social circle and the money raised goes to a good cause.

A recent example being when the Curry Club made 300 to 600 curries to fundraise for someone they knew who was running the London Marathon for the Alzheimer’s Society.

With businesses donating ingredients, spice, oil and other elements, the curry-ateers (normally more than three) socialise, cook, sell and have helped the likes of Marie Curie and the Sue Ryder Foundation.

Kammy said: “One of the big ones we did was for one of our colleagues who passed away and we did a curry club to be able to send her husband and children to Disneyland. We had a bit of money left over so we had a memorial bench done for them for their local park.”

Mixed ability sessions

Assuring an absorbing half-hour that’s well worth a listen on our podcast below when you get the chance, we discuss mixed ability cricket sessions at Bowling Old Lane CC.

Inspired by the visually impaired cricket that we both watch on Father’s Day, Kammy commented: “It can be seen as quite an obscure thing that not many people engage with but to have a visually impaired team at Bowling Old Lane is a big deal for us. It peaked a bit of interest in our minds to say, ‘can we do stuff for other people with disabilities?’ “

A collaboration with United Response, Mencap and International Mixed Ability Sports (IMAS) has led to sessions on a Tuesday and you only have to view Bowling Old Lane’s Facebook page to see the energy.

🎤 Listen to the podcast with Kammy

If the idea of a gentle listen over half an hour discussing cricket in inner-city Bradford, volunteering, women’s cricket and much more is your thing, click play above to dive into the episode.

Or you can subscribe to the Cricket Yorkshire Podcast on Spotify, CY Pod on Apple or other platforms.

Congratulations to Kammy Siddique and Bowling Old Lane, worth winners of the first Yorkshire Tea Community Cricket Award. You can nominate a volunteer from Yorkshire grassroots cricket each month until end of September 2025.

Thanks to Yorkshire Tea for their support in backing these awards as we seek to champion volunteers during the season in a new way and tell their stories.

Claire Bassindale from Otley Cricket Club was Highly Commended for the tremendous work that she’s done, along with others, in growing junior cricket and then launching the Otley Rockets.