Cricket: Gunnedah cricket president discusses season start and lower player numbers

That is the opinion of Gunnedah District Cricket Association president, Sam Doubleday, who spoke to the Leader a week out from the start of the 2023/24 season.

"Player numbers are a little bit down, but we're hopeful they'll pick back up soon," Doubleday said.

This season will feature the same four clubs as last year - Mornington, Kookaburras, Albion, and Court House - but Doubleday believes they are "scraping" teams together around core nuclei of long-time players.

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The season will get underway on Saturday with the first of three rounds of T20 games, which will be followed by one-dayers for the remainder of the rounds.

The decision to begin with several games in the shortest format, Doubleday said, was made in the hopes of inspiring further engagement from players.

"We're just trying to get player numbers back up," he said.

"Instead of freeing up your whole Saturday to play cricket, you can free up just a couple of hours and have a game."

The GDCA had the numbers to go ahead with a second grade competition in 2022/23, but those plans were scuppered by the floods which made accessing the requisite number of grounds difficult.

This year, plans for second grade are "progressing", Doubleday said.

"It's in the pipeline for this year. Again, it's just trying to get people interested to participate," he said.

When asked if the absence of a second grade competition last season might have contributed to the subsequent dip in numbers, Doubleday said "yes and no".

The primary reason for cricket's difficulty in attracting players, he believes, is due to the wide array of sports now available in summer.

"I think what's ultimately hurting player numbers is there's that many sports these days," Doubleday said.

"In years gone past, there was cricket in the summer and football or soccer in the winter. Now, there's almost sport on every single night."

While Doubleday does not begrudge other sports their success, he acknowledged that it has put the impetus on cricket to try and create more interest.

But, ultimately, he believes the numbers will pick back up.

"I'm hopeful we'll get some numbers back eventually," Doubleday said.

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