The below outline gives you details of what further cricket is available to Boys and Girls once they reach Year 6 and a meeting to be held on Tuesday the 1st of December at 6pm at the Canterbury Cricket offices Unit 2, Hazeldean Road (Hazeldean Business Park), Addington to begin to pull together the volunteer team to assist in this intake.

The Christchurch Junior Cricket Associations (CJCA) purpose is to provide the children of Christchurch with the foundation for lifelong participation, enjoyment and success in Cricket.  The Association has proudly been operating for over 60 years and has a respected place in Christchurch sport.

As well as organising Saturday and Interschool Cricket, once boys and girls reach Year 6 (year 5 in girls) there is an additional layer of CJCA cricket that children can become involved in to further their skills and have even more fun than they do from their involvement in their club or school team.

In terms of Boys cricket, the start of a childs year 6 at school, players are able to enrol in the CJCA Boys Summer Tournament which in 2021 will be held on three consecutive Sundays in February and March 2021.  Prior to this, assessments will be held to create even teams to participate in the Tournament.  This is so the matches have an even spread of players with certain skills i.e. wicket keepers, spinners etc.

On the 3 Sundays two 16/16 games of pairs cricket each day will be played with 8-a-side teams playing pairs cricket similiar to what they do on Saturdays.  Teams are a blend of players from all over the city and creates a great atmosphere for boys to meet new friends, have more fun and gain more skills.

VITAL PARENTAL INVOLVEMENT

These events cannot occur without a degree of parental support.  Teams do not train together so the only requirement of parents wishing to support the CJCA Tournaments is to coach/manage/score the teams on the Sundays.  We also require some parents to assist with the assessment of players so that we can create even teams so there are not mismatches.  In 2019 and 2020 there were 10 teams created but the number of teams will be determined by enrolments.  In the past 3 years approximately a third of each years Saturday players (280-300 players on a Saturday translates to 80-90 tournament players) wish to be involved so between 8-10 teams have regularly been arranged.

All the games are played beside one another on the Polo Grounds in Hagley Park.

The first assessments for the new intake of Year 6 at the start of 2021 are currently planned for Sunday the 14th of February 2021.

We need to find at least 4 “Lane Assessors” who have cricketing knowledge and can assess players on the batting/bowling skills against a scale in order to assist with creating teams – following the assessments the assessors will meet and create teams.  Players will be advised and Coaches/managers appointed – these are generally the lane assessors and others wishing to help.

YEAR CONVENOR/S

In addition to the assessors and coaches/managers we require we also need to appoint a Year Convenor/s who will co-ordinate this year group over the 3 years that they are involved with the CJCA until the children move onto Secondary school.  The CJCA General Manager provides significant support to this role.  The person/s filling this role needs to have good people management skills and a level of cricketing knowledge in order to develop good knowledge of the year group (both players and parents) during their involvement.  A working knowledge of Microsoft Excel would also be useful as we create a database/contact list using this programme.

The Year Convenor also sits on the CJCA Executive (meets once a month) during their time as year Convenor so they can be aware of the bigger picture of the operations of the CJCA.

FURTHER EXTENSION OPPORTUNITIES

Over and above the CJCA Tournaments (Summer and Spring) at Year 7 Level (end of Year 6 year) Festivals are held in the January School Holidays – depending on parental support the CJCA normally enters between 4 and 6 teams into these events which are held at either the Polo Grounds or at Mandeville, Ohoka, North Canterbury.

The CJCA does select full representative teams BUT only at Year 8 level and currently enters 2 teams of 11  into the South Island Primary Schools Tournament and we are certainly mindful of current discussions around the value or otherwise of having teams where players are deselected.

Each year there are CJCA 2 Tournaments organised – Summer in February/March and Spring (November) these are both 3 day events held on Sundays and these tournaments are replicated across all three groups 6,7 and 8 so on each of these days there are between 12-16 games held at venues across the city.

THE NEXT STEP

Anyone interested in being involved with the Year 2021 intake is asked to email the General Manager, Rob Wilkinson [email protected]

THERE WILL BE A MEETING OF INTERESTED PARENTS ON TUESDAY THE 1ST OF DECEMBER AT THE CANTERBURY CRICKET OFFICES AT UNIT 2, 14 HAZELDEAN ROAD, ADDINGTON FROM 6PM – THE MEETING WILL LAST NO LONGER THAN AN HOUR.