Keith Boyce, Head Groundsman at New Rover Cricket Club since 1999, knows a thing or two about cricket pitches. The former groundsman at Yorkshire County Cricket Club for 30 years (below right) is talking about plotting safe passage across a boggy outfield to get the heavy equipment on: “It’s
Table Cricket is an adapted form of the game for children with disabilities, played in schools across the UK on a table tennis table. It’s been on my radar for a while to learn more about this inclusive game of strategy - and where better than the 2023 Yorkshire Champions:
Deepa Chukkapalli, a 13-year-old cricketer who plays for Bradford Park Avenue Ladies, has been selected for the Spanish National Women's cricket squad. Spanish Ladies head to Brescia in May to face Italy in a T10 series and Chukkapalli, picked by Spain for the first time, is
Shakil Manir smiles back at me over Zoom, while snow carpets the garden and we discuss disability cricket. As the Yorkshire Cricket Board’s Disability Development Manager, Shakil has his finger on the pulse when it comes to current programmes and what’s coming up in 2024. Disability cricket in
Chatting to Sarah Pollard on a Zoom call, the story of Yorkshire’s County Scoring Officer is one of a love of maths but also sharing knowledge with others. In both her day job as a secondary school maths teacher and outside of that as a Level 3 cricket scorer
Harriet Barber, winner of this year’s Yorkshire Cricket Board Game Changer Award, is a prime example of the expansion of a volunteer’s role. She’s been at Frecheville Community Cricket Club for nearly eight years now; beginning as a player with the U15s. With her move to the
Clare Sanderson shares her path in cricket from launching Alwoodley-Leos Ladies to coaching girls' teams and development work overseas with Cricket Without Boundaries. #hergametoo and #wegotgame are both hashtags relating to women in sport. Here’s a little something about what they mean for me - and my journey
The start of my interview with the Yorkshire Cricket Board’s Soyeb Kayat (below) begins with a question - just not by me. “So…is this going to be like This is Your Life then?” I guess that makes me Michael Aspel if you’re of a certain vintage to recall
It becomes apparent minutes into our conversation that Kiran Bali’s professional and personal journey has been about breaking barriers but also advocating change. The magistrate and community volunteer, who won an MBE in 2008 for her community work in West Yorkshire, has taken those beliefs and brought them into
With clubs in the midst of their All Stars and Dynamos programmes, it felt like a good time to share this interview with Joanne Wootton of Worsbrough Bridge Cricket Club. She's at the heart of one of the most successful programmes in the area, with lots of girls
This is the story of Great Horton Church; a thriving, inner-city cricket club in Bradford whose community outreach stretches far beyond the game. I’m anticipating traffic congestion to get to Allerton Road in BD8 for the usual 6.15pm start. As it turns out, the drive over the
I caught up with a Level 2 cricket coach, Alex Brown, who combines playing for Wrenthorpe in the Bradford Premier League with improving young cricketers. Here's our Q&A... Hey Alex, what's your cricket background? I’ve played cricket since I was around five years
Mel Mahmood is a cricket umpire and Participation Manager for the Yorkshire Cricket Southern Premier League. Here she shares her journey in cricket, the women's and girls' game in South Yorkshire as well as a formal link-up with the Premier League. *** I was 45 years old
Paul Cummins, the Yorkshire Cricket Board’s Director of Recreational Cricket, is talking to me from Headingley about what lies ahead. Three months into the job, the honeymoon period (if there is one in that role) has seen him zip around the region, meeting some of the staff and no
Grace Hall’s path to representing the Northern Diamonds Academy began with a chance encounter at school. It speaks to how cricket can captivate us at an early age if we get the chance. Grace’s story, just like Mollie Ovenden, is of a young woman whose appetite for the
Though we've never met, Mollie Ovenden strikes me as a cricketer who doesn't wait for opportunities to come her way but grabs them. She has represented Yorkshire in county age group cricket, captained a men's league team (Raskelf) in her teens, and at just
