Order of Annual Report v Chairman's Report v Administration & Community Development Officer Reports v South Canterbury Umpires & Scorers Report v Financial Report v South Canterbury Representative Honours Board All Grades v End of Season Awards v Team Awards v Sponsorship 1 Chairman's Annual Report 2014/2015 It is my pleasure to present the Chairman's report for the 2014/2015 season. After a fantastic World Cup where our Black Caps won the hearts of the cricketing world we are looking forward to attracting more players, coaches, administrators and sponsors to South Canterbury cricket for the coming season. The Board only had one change this year with Greg O'Brien not standing and I replaced him. Andrew McRae's increasing work commitments saw him stand down as chairman and I was elected to replace him. I would personally like to acknowledge and thank Andrew for his contribution and support he has given SC Cricket over the past 10 years, we are very fortunate to have someone with his skills and calibre continuing on the Board. I would also like to thank all the Board members for their time and commitment. A special mention to Mark Medlicott our Executive Officer who really is the face (voice & scribe) of South Canterbury cricket, the hours he puts into cricket and his commitment to the region would be hard to better. Shane Gilkison has continued in the role of development officer and has performed an admirable role in delivering New Zealand Cricket programmes to our stakeholders. He continues to grow into the role and again, we are lucky to have his services. Last season we hosted two one day games with both Central Districts and Auckland playing Canterbury on the 2nd and 5th of January respectively. While we have had some high quality cricket over the past 5 years the crowd numbers have been disappointing. Due to the high cost of maintaining the pitch and hosting the games we have decided not to host any First Class matches for the coming season. After a very tough season last year, and the late withdrawal of coach Robyn Beeby for business reasons, the Hawke Cup team competed extremely well. With outright victories over Southland and North Otago and an away 1st innings win over Otago Country we were only 4 wickets from an outright against Mid Canterbury when rain stopped play. This ultimately cost us a Hawke Cup challenge. With a number of new players to the squad it was very pleasing to see the “team” really work hard and perform with credit. Our JAB teams also performed well with a Primary A team finishing 2nd equal at their South Island tournament and the Year 5 & 6 team 3rd. Celtic again had an exceptionally successful season winning all three senior competitions: the Placemakers 20/20, the Daily Freightways one day trophy and the Tweedy Cup. They are a well administrated club and have significant depth as demonstrated by their relationship with Roncalli and their sound performances in the lower grades. It is extremely pleasing to see Pleasant Point entering the senior ranks in 2015/16, after winning the 2nd Grade competition, and with 5 junior teams they are numerically our second strongest Club. The continued growth in junior playing numbers in Waimate, Temuka and Geraldine is also pleasing and crucial to the survival of cricket in the Country regions. The Board has set Gilky and Artha some challenging goals around visits to all local Clubs and I encourage you all to make the most of their visits. These are designed to help develop our young keen cricketers and also provide support and guidance to coaches and managers. 2 I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of our loyal sponsors and also our supporters in the gaming industry this season. They continue to give generously to the Association. Please support our sponsors so they can continue to support us. I would also like to thank all administrators, coaches, umpires and players for their time and commitment in ensuring the game is in good heart in this region. As I've mentioned before the administration of the Association is here to serve the players and all volunteers at school and club level. Please feel free to contact me to discuss concerns or issues you may have at any time throughout the season. David Fisher Chairman 3 S.C Cricket Association Annual Report 2014/15 INTRODUCTION The 2014-15 season was yet another season of change for South Canterbury, with the World Cup meaning quite a change to the competition structure, especially in senior grade and also the effect the World Cup had on the Hawke Cup campaign. There were also changes to the Board of control with David Fisher coming onto the Board and taking over the role of chairman from Andrew McRae due to his work commitments, although we did retain his services on the Board which was good. The Board consists of seven members which includes a players' representative and the Board now has a wide range of skills available with a mix of past players and businessmen with Board members now assigned to specific areas within our overall administration. I have continued in the role of CEO and Shane Gilkison continued in his role as Cricket Development Officer delivering the development programme to school children throughout South Canterbury. We have also utilised the coaching skills of Prabodha Arthavidu, a young cricketer from Sri Lanka who after two seasons has made a permanent home in Timaru with his wife and has proved very popular with Primary and Secondary school boys and girls and helped to ease Shane's role. He was especially helpful when Shane was away at the World Cup as liaison officer for the UAE for 7 weeks delivering classes to schools and helping to set up new programmes we have begun with our clubs and also this season where he has had to take on the main coach role due to Shane's injury. REPRESENTATIVE CRICKET: Our Hawke Cup Challenge possibilities faded in the last elimination game when we were unable to beat Otago Country outright, but finished second to North Otago which was a very pleasing result with a young team whom we expect to improve as they are all likely to stay in our region for the foreseeable future. Prabodha Arthavidu was our best performer scoring over 700 runs for our senior men this season, and is determined to improve on that next season. My thanks to David Fisher and Barry Ward who helped with 'training' and also to the players who contributed despite not having an official coach. The Primary A team came 2nd equal at tournament held in Blenheim in January which was an outstanding result, and only came 15 runs short of tying for first after drawing with Dunedin in their final match, a great result considering they had been beaten outright in the pre- tournament match. Two boys featured in the overall tournament stats with Ben Cosgriff finishing the top wicket- taker while William Sharp featured in the top bowling and batting stats. My thanks to coach Hayden Inkster who stepped up at late notice and to manager Graham Sharp for an outstanding job which was shown in the tournament results. 4 The Year 5 & 6 and Year 7 teams also completed their best tournament results, with Yr 7 finishing 6/10 but winning two matches and having a third possible win washed out, a big improvement on previous Yr 7 results while the Yr 5 & 6 finished 3/12 which was again an excellent result and hopefully bodes well for them as they move up the grades. I would especially like to thank David Fisher, Simon Davenport for their work coaching and managing these teams alongside Shane Gilkison and Prabodha Arthavidu. The Primary Girls struggled at tournament but this year had a win and to top it off had Grace Kelliher chosen as a bowler in the tournament team. The positive is that most of the girls this year will still be at Primary School next season so are hoping they can build on this experience. Well done to Mick Geary, Brendan Cairns, Graham Sharp and other helpers for keeping these girls enthused along with coach Amy Beeby. South Canterbury also entered teams in the U15 and U17 tournaments. The U15s performed well gaining three wins at tournament to have their best tournament in years but the U17s finished last despite having home advantage and is perhaps a reflection on the quality of cricket these boys are playing in for their 1st XI. The U15 Boys are fortunate to have former White Fern Rowen Milburn as coach while Mike Otley has continued his long service as coach of South Canterbury representative teams by looking after the U17s. The Secondary Girls also took part in their tournament, but again found the going tough, especially after the perceived most even game against Mid Canterbury didn't happen after MC failed to front. They worked hard all season with coach Amy Beeby, but it is always a battle getting the girls to commit to tournament as well. The revised winter training programme, along with the support this season from the CCA sending high performance coaches meant we had a lot better turnouts to the sessions. The sessions were fewer but more productive, and the feedback was very positive. It also meant that coaches got the opportunity to spot any local talent and offer them further opportunities moving forward. CLUB CRICKET: This year with the changes to competition formats, two types of competitions were run with the standard one day 45/45 over competition on Saturdays as well as two full rounds of T20 played on a mix of Friday nights and Saturdays.