On Monday night we ran the last of our three winter club forums, with the final one taking place at North London CC. Each two hour session saw a number of club representatives, from all across the county, coming together in highly engaging and rewarding discussion.
Led by Josh Knappett, Angus Fraser, and the Middlesex Participation Team, the purpose of the sessions were to allow our team to share the outcomes and priorities from the Facility Strategy which was developed last year, with the input from our clubs.
It was brilliant to listen to some of the great work that our clubs are doing to support their members, engage local communities, and grow the game.
A few highlights from what the clubs are most proud about were:
There was really valuable discussion sharing the emerging themes, process and insights from our recently developed 10-year facility strategy. This led into conversations tackling key topics of the role of the Facility Advisory Panel, which underpins a strategic priority to establish: ‘Accountable Decision Making’ especially their role with County Grant Funds application reviews.
Other key discussions was on the promotion of non-turf pitches (NTPs) with wide ranging need, opportunity, and barriers for getting more capacity and play onto NTPs across a wider cross-section of our game in London and on Hybrid pitches which many clubs are starting to learn more about.
It was also a highly valuable experience to listen and speak on a range of other topics in a more open communicative way, with a number of other takeaways for us to learn from as we continue to build and prioritise our club relationships and club development we want to support.
We look forward to keeping these club forums as a key part of our club engagement for affiliated clubs in 2024/25 winter.
Thank you to everyone who attended, and a special thanks to Indian Gymkhana CC, Pinner CC, and North London CC, for hosting these evenings.
Speaking of another year of successful Club forum's, Middlesex Cricket's Facilities and Project Lead, Josh Knappett, commented:
"Having launched our Club forums last year, which proved hugely successful, we were in little doubt that we would commit to running them again in 2024.
"To be able to go out to Clubs, speak to them, hear the issues they are facing, and discuss how we can work together and help each other, has proved invaluable in helping us to build and maintain close relationships with the Clubs across our county.
"Our thanks go to all the Clubs who hosted the events and we look forward to running more Club forums in the months ahead."
A snapshot of the feedback we've received from Clubs over the past six weeks is as follows:
“I value highly the support and guidance we receive from Middlesex across the board of our activities. Hearing from other clubs about the challenges we share with them is also valuable, particularly this time regarding EDI and the provision of women's and girl's facilities in obsolete pavilions. The information and discussion around hybrid pitches was interesting and timely."
“Really good event. I think the icebreaker worked really well - provoking cross club conversations / connections. The session on pitches was interesting."
“I would encourage them to continue. There's maybe merit in a future session on Middlesex's EDI plan / progress / feedback. Which I appreciate happens through the EDI Sub-Committee (where there a club reps etc etc) - but would be good to have a more open show/tell/feedback."
