As the weather has deteriorated further over the past week most of the leagues in Lancashire have deferred the start of their season to the end of April.
Last night the JW Lees Lancashire League took the decision to acknowledge that most clubs stand little to no chance of staging cricket in the near term and have decided to delay the start of the season to Saturday 27th April for third team fixtures and Sunday 28th April for the senior teams.
Our ground has been badly affected by the weather and specifically there is an area from the pavilion across to the War Memorial which is exceptionally wet.
We respectfully therefore ask that no matter how attractive the ground may look over the weekend if the sun does actually emerge please stay off the playing area at all times.
There are a couple of further adjustments to our plans as a result of this action .
Junior Cricket
The first junior practice night will now be held on Friday 3rd May from 6pm. On Friday 26th April we will have a registration and signing up session between 5 and 7pm at the club.
Any junior matches arranged w/c 22nd April will be cancelled as previously communicated .
Senior cricket and training
Fixtures cancelled for the first two weeks are likely to be rearranged, we don’`’t have specific details as yet but this will be discussed on April 24th at a League meeting.
All other fixtures will currently follow the calendar so the first team will host Rawtenstall on Sunday 28th and the thirds will host Rishton on Saturday 27th – subject of course to the weather and our ability to get the ground ready!!
Senior training has been taking place indoors at PA Cricket on Tuesdays and Thursdays, this will continue in the interim, certainly including next Tuesday 16th subject to availability.
We will provide an update on when the ground is fit for senior practice and net training however right now it is not possible to use the ground in any capacity.
Players should liaise with their senior team captains or age group managers if still in any doubt on the short term plans.
Obviously we need a sustained spell of dry and warmer weather in order to both let the ground clear up and also get on it to conduct the work desperately needed to get ready to play.
We don`t like having to ask people not to come on the ground and we absolutely don`t like seeing matches cancelled however I am sure you will all understand we cant control the weather. The action taken by the League is sensible and at least allows a 2 week period to try and recover lost time.
Thanks as always for your continued support and we look forward to having some exciting cricket to watch in the coming weeks.
Please get that sun dance working!!