It's all change at Stalybridge Cricket Club

The 2021 cricket season has marked the beginning of a new chapter for Stalybridge Cricket Club, with the formation of a junior development programme reaping dividends already, a revitalised club house thrust into the 21st century, and two vice-captains aiming to take the first team to glory in the Derbyshire and Cheshire Cricket League.

As frustrating as the past 12 months has been for sports clubs up and down the country, the spare time has allowed members of the club to regroup and lay the foundations for future success, with vice-captain Adam Harwick appointed as the man to establish a thriving junior section at Gorse Hall Road.

It's a responsibility he hasn't taken lightly, but one he has embraced with open arms in the full knowledge that club's, especially those in Tameside with limited funds, are reliant on a strong junior set-up to ensure the future prosperity of the game.

Adam, who has a longstanding allegiance with the club, has been overwhelmed by the reaction to the club's junior programme since launching at the start of the season. Numbers have grown week-on-week, to a point where Adam has recruited a number of other players from the first team to help him out with the training session on Friday night. Speaking to Reporter Sport about the programme, Adam said: "I think on the first week 24 attended, and then 27 came down the following week. Numbers then increased from 42 to 51, so it's been brilliant to see.

"To be honest I only anticipated that my son's football team, which is about 11 players, would come to the training session, but I think we've been quite fortunate because we started it quite early. We announced that we would launch the programme about four months ago and we pushed it as much as possible on social media, sent the message out to local schools, and we were also helped out by the Tameside Sport and Physical Activity Network. At the beginning, we said we just wanted to form an under 11s team and would see how that would go, but then we submitted an under 13s side as well with the view of using players in the 11s squad to also play in the older age group. I've never seen the ground have full use of the pitch, so we've split the ground into children that fall in the age bracket of 9-13 that use the hard ball, and then the younger children train are split into four groups on the other side of the ground playing soft ball cricket."  

Such has been the lack of junior cricket at Gorse Hall Road in recent times, 34-year-old Adam believes it was his generation that last formed a junior team at the club. He says the juniors' first fixture at Tintwistle two weeks ago was a special moment for himself and the club. "To be part of it is a great feeling and to field a team, as we did at Tintwistle, was a special feeling."

Adam now shares his time between training the juniors and leading the first team, alongside vice-captain Mike Whitworth, in Division One against sides including Dinting, Broadbottom and Newton. It's a role he takes great pride in, but one that comes with added pressure now the club is established in Division One. "Myself and Mike are hoping for a mid-table finish and that we'll stand our ground. We had a game against Dinting a few weeks ago and ran them close, whereas we played them in the cup a few years ago and were miles off, so from a progression point of view it's encouraging."

You can listen to a full interview with Adam on our website, www.questmedianetwork.co.uk