The women’s bat and ball game is growing further.
Goulburn Murray Cricket has appointed a dedicated women’s cricket management committee in response to rising participation in the region, one of the first of its kind in country cricket.
Kate Carlile, Brayden Carey, Sheree Farnham, Wendy Moyle, and Maxine Piggot form the recently appointed Women’s Management Committee, and several additions to the 2022-23 season schedule have already been made.
Two new clubs will join the ranks of the senior cricket grades, with Waaia Cricket Club joining the now six-team A-grade competition and Rochester set to embark on its maiden women’s cricket season in B-grade.
A-grade will now contain Beechworth, Echuca, Bamawm-Lockington United, Shepparton-Youth Club United, Leitchville-Gunbower, and Waaia.
B-grade will now be formed by Kyabram Fire Brigade, Echuca, Moama, Kyabram, BLU, Nathalia and Rochester.
At the junior level, a dedicated under-12 program will help the future Elyse Perry’s and Meg Lanning’s bridge the gap between Master Blasters and under-14s.
“Without a sustainable junior model we’re not going to be able to feed into the senior competition,” Carlile said.
“Currently, there’s junior blasters, which is five to eight-year-olds, and Master Blasters, which is your modified competition. After that you generally move into under-12 boys.
“We just felt that (juniors) come from that really modified cricket into a bit more.
“A lot of the girls don’t grow up playing cricket like the boys do from a really young age. It’s a way of preparing girls to play in competition cricket.
“We’re trying to keep those girls engaged but also make them feel confident, because the next step is under-14s and that’s a pretty big jump.
“(Under-12s) is just going to be some coaching with some modified games, right down to the basics of how to run in pads and wearing a helmet — no one has really experienced that at that modified junior level.”
The program will complement the pre-existing under-14 girls competition and two senior cricket grades.
Committee member Kate Carlile said with the women’s game continuing to grow in northern Victoria, a dedicated approach was required.
“Women’s cricket is a real growth area,” Carlile said.
“We just thought that we needed to dedicate, as a league, a group to oversee the operations of the women’s league.
“Men and women’s cricket are at different stages in Goulburn Murray cricket; we’ve only been around for five years.
“We don’t have the big numbers participating so we’re at a really different stage.”
With more than a quarter of Victoria’s cricket representation now made up of women and girls, Carlile said it would be thrilling to see that number reflected at league level, and if current trends continue that might well be the case in coming seasons.
Taking into account juniors right through to seniors, Carlile said playing numbers were well north of 200 during the 2021-22 season.
“We’re still under that goal of ‘wouldn’t it be great to have a third of the competition made up of women’,” Carlile said.
GMC Committee re-appointed
Goulburn Murray Cricket president Jason Turner has been re-appointed as the association’s president at its recent annual general meeting.
Turner continues into his tenure into a sixth year, joined by Michael Mott (vice-president), Kirk Teasdale (finance), and Marcus Maher on the executive committee.
Kate Carlile, Sheree Farnham, Glen McFaddin, and Dylan Cuttriss will form the general committee for the 2022-23 season.