Broadford Cricket Club will play in the Gisborne District Cricket Association, GDCA, for season 2023-24.
Broadford has transferred from Seymour District Cricket Association, SDCA, where it had fielded senior and junior teams since the SDCA’s inception in the early 1960s.
GDCA clubs voted to accept Broadford at its annual general meeting, AGM, last month, following in the same path as Kilmore Cricket Club, who left the SDCA last year to join the GDCA.
Broadford Cricket Club secretary Liam Withers said junior teams largely influenced the move.
“The juniors had dropped off a fair bit in the SDCA in numbers and the standard slightly,” he said.
“We reached out to Gisborne to gauge how their juniors go and it was pretty appealing to us.
“It’s a bigger area that it covers so that means hopefully more sponsors.
“Some players we’ve lost recently might come back and we might attract new players.”
SDCA president Ben Trezise said the move was disappointing and the SDCA had approached Cricket Victoria to prevent it.
“We asked if, in the best interest of local cricket, Cricket Victoria can stop the move but apparently they can’t,” Mr Trezise said.
“Cricket Victoria doesn’t have any legislation or governance over clubs and movements.
“In cricket, they can move willy nilly without any approval, which is sad because all that does is make stronger associations stronger and we’re stuck in the middle.
“They can’t just make a smaller competition less competitive and viable and then tell those clubs to survive and look after themselves.
“As a cricket community you’ve got to look after everybody and not just go ‘oh yeah that’s good for us’ but consider the other side and ask is that good for them.
“While we wish all the clubs well for their futures, we’ve got to look after ourselves as well. We’re a local cricket community. We’ve got to look after each other.”
Eastern Hill Cricket Club had also applied to transfer away from the SDCA, to Cricket Shepparton, but the move was rejected.
Mr Tresize said the SDCA did not have the opportunity to discuss Broadford’s move with the GDCA committee.
“I would’ve loved to have had the opportunity to speak to the GDCA about the move but unlike the Shepparton competition, they never contacted us,” Mr Trezise said.
“Cricket Shepparton actually sat with our executive committee deciding it was in the best interest to local cricket that Eastern Hill not move.
“Eastern Hill weren’t overly happy with me, but I’ve got to look after a competition, not just one club. It’s the bigger picture of local community and local sport. You’ve got to have somewhere for kids to play.
“People want a strong competition and I completely understand that but sometimes you have to look at the bigger picture.”
SDCA and Cricket Australia have a five-year plan to increase junior numbers.
“We recommitted to the plan with Cricket Victoria last year and Broadford had also committed to that. They agreed to reassess after two years to see if this plan was evolving and going forward, which it already has after one year,” Mr Trezise said.
“Unfortunately [Broadford] decided to change their minds and left. It is a bit disappointing, but we wish them well.”
Mr Withers said the club had run out of time last year to pursue a move to the GDCA for the 2022-23 season and had committed to the SDCA but they had never agreed to commit to the SDCA for two years.
“The GDCA were very understanding of this and told us they would be open to talks with us anytime. We felt we needed to pursue a move again,” he said.
“At that moment we committed to the SDCA for the 2022-23 season with the idea that we would assess the situation again at some point prior to or during the season.
“Each year at our AGM we decide where our affiliation would lie for the season ahead and I feel it would be reckless of us to agree to any association for more than a season at a time.”
Mr Withers said prior to the season’s commencement, Broadford Cricket Club presented some ‘growth measures’ to the SDCA setting timeframes for when they would like to see improvement or action taken to show league improvement.
He said by November there were some important measures not being met or had any action taken to meet them.
It was then Broadford’s committee agreed to pursue the GDCA move for 2023-24.
Mr Withers said they were upfront and honest with the SDCA during the process.
The SDCA will vote on competition structure at its AGM on August 7, with the league expecting to go from 18 to 15 teams.
It has been proposed the league reformat their three senior grades to a two-competition structure.
Mr Withers said Broadford returning to the SDCA in the future was not completely rejected.
“There is always a possibility of returning, however we are heading to the GDCA for the upcoming season and we look froward to the challenges ahead,” he said.
