Page 10 - West Pennant Hills Cherrybrook Cricket Club Yearbook 2015-16

JUNIORS’ REPORT
The 2015-16 season was a successful one in many ways.
We saw a massive jump in junior registrations to more than 450 players - which resulted in us forming a record 40 junior teams (up from 31 teams in 2014-15). Our Under 15s age group actually increased from 2 to 3 teams, something I don’t believe has happened previously.
We fielded 12 teams across our Under 8 and 9 age groups. Most of these players were playing junior cricket for the first time and it is always pleasing to see such strong numbers in under 8s and 9s as this means we are well placed for coming years.
This dramatic increase in numbers naturally brought with it some growing pains. I am pleased to say we found coaches and managers for the additional teams, acquired additional gear and we all squeezed into the same number of training grounds.
We changed our junior presentation day format this year by separating into two groups of U8-11s and U12- 16s. While this was a necessity due to our increased numbers – the overwhelming feedback to the change was positive, so we will continue with this format next year.
Our junior Girls’ division has also grown leaps and bounds under the expert leadership of Graham Chivers (see Graham’s report). This resulted in a separate presentation evening held for the girls’ division, whereas it used to be combined.
So, to summarise, your club is strong. I believe this is due not only to our culture and ‘participation over results’ ethos but also to the massive time and effort so many volunteers put in throughout the year.
We measure success not by premierships, but by retention of our junior players year to year. This year 13 of our Under 16 players were awarded the Arthur Souter trophy. This recognizes junior players who have played continuously with WPHCCC from Kangas right through to Under 16s. That means the majority of our U16 players this season have played together with our club for nine or ten years!
In terms of team performances, our Under 11 Green team secured the premiership. We had 7 junior teams playing in semi finals and we were represented in U11, U13, U14 and U16 grand finals. To put that in perspective, one third of our competition-aged teams made the finals.
There were many outstanding individual performances within our junior ranks this season including hat- tricks for Louis Madison-Hanlon (U14 White), Harry Fisher (U10 Green) and Xavier McConaghie (U13 Green). We had an impressive 7 5-fors including Callum Watson who achieved two 5-fors. To cap it off we had three centurians with Josh Banner (U16 Gold) 103* , Riley Behlevanas (U16 Gold) 102* and Rowan Love (U15 Blue) 100.
Country Carnivals
Each year our club is invited to send teams to Under 14, 15 and 16 country rep carnivals. We are the only club invited to do so – and so this represents a unique opportunity for players at WPHCCC.
I can say from personal experience these carnivals provide a fantastic experience, not only for the players but for their families and supporters who come along for a week of fun.
This season Andrew Morris, Brendan Harkin and Brendan Flynn each led a team of U14s, U15s and U16s respectively to Tamworth, Armidale and Taree.
Unfortunately the Taree carnival was abandoned on day two after the early January East Coast torrent. You will recall the SCG test was also abandoned. The Tamworth and Armidale carnivals went off with no interruptions – and attracted much media coverage including local TV news interviews with some of our parents.
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