Hidden behind trees in the gloom of dimly lit street lamps, the Lees Hall Golf Club is easy to miss on a dank autumnal evening. As I park – having turned around after initially driving straight past – and step out of my car, the only signs of life in the deserted car park come from another vehicle out of which two men in their later years emerge.
“Is this the right place for the cricket meeting?” I enquire. “It is,” one of them replies. “And I’m guessing by the fact you’re half the age of anyone else coming tonight that you’re the guest speaker.”
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His assumption is correct, at least the speaker part (I am at least a decade too old for the other bit of his statement to be entirely accurate, but the sentiment remains).
On entering the golf club, something of a commotion is apparent in the main function room. The Sheffield Cricket Lovers have bought a new banner to provide a backdrop for their regular meetings, but – as the pained combined efforts of four committee members show – the latest purchase is proving harder to erect than anticipated. “I’m pleased to see it has a red ball on it rather than a white ball,” notes one attendee once the task has been completed.
Every couple of weeks or so, somewhere in the region of 50 people head to Lees Hall, on the southern outskirts of Sheffield, for an evening in the presence of a guest speaker from the world of cricket. Sometimes it is a former England international – Devon Malcolm, Dean Headley and Craig White are among recent speakers. Other times a coach, commentator or author. Tonight, they have assembled to hear me ramble about my book, Batting for Time: The Fight to Keep English Cricket Alive, and the uncertain future of the domestic game.
It is a scene replicated up and down the country during the year’s bleakest months. Between October and March – English cricket’s traditional period of hibernation – more than 30 cricket societies host regular talks, meals and events to provide the sport’s enthusiasts an opportunity to gather during the off-season.
The Sheffield Cricket Lovers, of which Joe Root’s grandfather Don is a some-time attendee, has existed since 1960. “It’s a meeting of like minds,” says the vice-chair, Andy Pack. “Most of the audience we have here, and at all cricket societies, will be of the mature variety. They maybe don’t get the opportunity to talk cricket to too many people because of their age and circumstances. They are also a generation that enjoys the sort of presentation that goes on at a cricket society. They might not be into YouTube or podcasts or things like that.
“ It’s an opportunity to speak to people who have been involved in the game and an entry into something they have probably loved for a long time.”
English cricket, on a domestic level, is going through its latest existential crisis. The spread of franchise leagues threatening to alter the wider sport’s longstanding natural hierarchy has resulted in the controversial creation of the Hundred and a sale process many believe will change everything county cricket has stood for since the Victorian age. As players jet off to play in lucrative leagues from South Africa to Canada, and India to Zimbabwe, more questions emerge over how the county structure can continue and what its purpose is.
To many cricket lovers, the community aspect of county clubs and societies – who, unsurprisingly, have a hefty crossover in membership base – is paramount. At Somerset, for example, the club’s foundation hosts monthly Walkers & Talkers events throughout winter, inviting members to chat to one another and invited guests, while strolling around Taunton’s County Ground.
Rob Kelly, the Norfolk Cricket Society secretary, suggests their group’s social value is at the heart of its monthly events. “It’s an opportunity to converse and keep in touch with people outside of the cricket season,” he says. “There’s a wellbeing element to it. During the dark winter months it provides people with a bit of focus.”
Yet, as noted by the arrivals in the Sheffield golf club car park, a common struggle between the societies is an ageing demographic. Mirroring the endless wranglings over domestic first-class cricket, their future is a worry. “We are trying to attract younger people but I’m in my 50s and probably the youngest person we get regularly is in his mid-40s,” says Kelly.
“It is a concern, but we’re enjoying it while it lasts. It is sad when I look back 10 years at a list of people who came on any given night and there are those who are unfortunately no longer with us.
“ We’re always trying to attract new members. We all put on a good evening and want more people to come along because it’s a nice thing to come to. At the moment I’m still positive about it, but I don’t look too far into the future.”
There are about 4,000 cricket society members in Britain, gathering to chew the fat during the autumn/winter months. At the Derbyshire Cricket Society, the first hand up during my post-talk Q&A results in an unexpected barrage over the ECB’s recently amended transgender policy.
At the Yorkshire Southern Group, it shamefully takes me an hour – “So did you used to play cricket yourself?” rapidly surging to the top of daft questions I have asked someone – to realise the person I have been happily chatting to over lunch is the former Yorkshire and England all-rounder Richard Hutton, son of the great batter Sir Len.
Every society meeting promises surprises, informed discussion and no shortage of passion. The first delivery of the new season would be a longer time coming without them.
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