Welcome to the 2025 cricket season
Welcome to the 2025 cricket season. For those who are new to the club a very warm Wisborough welcome, and a particular welcome to Wizzy News – our weekly roundup of news and events at Wisborough Green Cricket Club.
Regular readers will know the format of Wizzy News – a bit of news about cricket, information about what’s going on in the community , and a good old chuckle about this and that. We don’t take ourselves too seriously at the club and we enjoy having a dig at players and personalities at the club, so if you’re important enough to be a target of our humour please take it as a compliment. Please click here for back copies of our Wizzy News newsletters which have all been posted in the ‘newsletter’ link on our web site.
We are all looking forward to a fantastic cricket season ahead. This year is going to be particularly special as its the very first time that our under 11′ s will be playing League cricket and our Ladies will be playing in a hardball League.
We had a fantastic turnout at the first Friday evening training session on the Green last week – great to see everyone again
Welcome from our Chairman – Tarnie Dixon
Our Chairman, Tarnie Dixon welcomed everyone on Friday evening – for those who missed it see his welcome message below
Ladies and gentlemen, esteemed parents, and talented young cricketers,
A warm welcome to all of you for the this first junior cricket training evening! My name is Tarni Dixon, and I am Chair of the Club. It’s a great pleasure to see so many young players filled with enthusiasm for what promises to be an exciting season ahead.
To our young cricket stars, where your dreams take flight with every swing of the bat, every delivery bowled, and every spectacular catch. You’re not just here to play a game; you are here to embrace the spirit of sportsmanship, camaraderie, and resilience. Remember, each ball bowled, each run scored, and each wicket taken is a testament to your dedication and skill.
And to you wonderful parents who have entrusted us with their children’s aspirations, welcome to WGCC a community built on support, inclusivity, safety, encouragement, and having fun.
Many thanks go to all the coaches, parent helpers, age-group administrators, umpires, scorers and BBQuers who will be supporting the players over the course of the season. The success of the Junior section would simply not be possible without the countless hours of precious time that are generously given up by so many volunteers. We are very grateful for all you do. We are always looking for more parents to get involved with the club so if you feel like you would like to help then please do not hesitate to speak to me or one of the coaches.
As we embark on this season together, let us embrace the essence of cricket – a game that teaches us much more than just how to hit a ball or bowl a perfect yorker. It teaches us resilience in the face of defeat, humility in victory, and the importance of fair play.
Welcome to the beginning of a memorable journey. Let’s play cricket, let’s learn, let’s grow, let’s make every moment count and let’s enjoy it.
Welcome message from our Head of Juniors – Phil Maggs
Thank you Tarni for those rousing words about this club. A club that was founded in the 1840’s, but even before this there are records of cricket being played in this village since the late 18th Century.
Why the longevity? this is village cricket at its finest. We are an inclusive club and seek to give every child an opportunity to play. Above all we will try to spark a lifelong interest in cricket in all our juniors, and we very much hope that when they are our age and may have children of their own, that as spring arrives, they will bring their children to a club very much like this one.
We are also a forward-thinking club and I am delighted to say that this year we have Tim Van Noort, a professional coach joining us for technical skills coaching and our hope is that every junior playing hardball cricket will get to spend some time with him. Tim formerly was head of identifying talent for the Sussex pathway and his experience will be a great addition to the club for both juniors and seniors.
We are lucky enough to have in our ranks two coaches whose efforts in coaching junior cricket has been acknowledged by Sussex County Cricket, Alen Lang and Peter Klein both receiving awards in the last few years. Between them they have started the cricketing journey of hundreds of juniors.
I would like to introduce you to the coaching team and organisers, a great group of volunteers.
Under 5/6/7’s – Alen Lang
Under 8/9’s – Dan Vickery/Tarni Dixon, Organiser – Suzana Braddock
U10’s – Peter Klein – Organiser – Emily Hendley
U11’s – Adam Roberts/Peter Klein – Organiser – Chloe Boxall
U12’s – Mark Brown/Peter Klein and other – Organiser – Ashley Roberts
U14’s – Philip Maggs and Dave McCullagh – Organiser – Suzana Braddock
Lesley Price is our safeguarding office and this year she will be joined by Hetty Palmer.
We are always looking for parent helpers to set up on match days and also to score, and if anyone here would like to help coach then the club will put you through a coaching course for this, please see myself or Tarni if this is something that interests you.
These are exciting times to be a member of WGCC as we have just had planning permission granted to build a new clubhouse/pavilion, there will be more information on this and the fund-raising challenge that awaits us in due course.
Thank – you
A lot goes into into preparing the grounds ahead of the season – many thanks to all those who have put in time and effort for the benefit of us all. Thanks in particular to Lee Farquar our Groundsman, Mick Hollands our Grounds Co-ordinator and the Wizzy Rollers who have spent many hours rolling the square
Can you help in any way ?
We are expecting over 200 juniors to enjoy playing cricket this year which is in itself a major undertaking. There is an increasingly smaller group of volunteers who put a lot of effort to keep the show on the road and we would welcome support from parents – particularly scorers , umpires , tea makers etc etc . If you are able to help in any way please do let us know. We could do with a lot more help – even if its on an occasional basis
Fixture card
Hard copies of the fixture card are available in the Pavilion – Please click here for an electronic version of the fixture card
Club 200
We had the first Club 200 draw of the season on Friday evening.
By way of background Club 200, formerly known as the Century Club, is one of the club’s main fundraising activities. Established by a past President Ray Greatorex, the Century club has grown in numbers from 100 to now just over 200 tickets. Half the funds raised are returned in cash prizes for the ticket holders. The other half supports the cost of running Wisborough Green Cricket Club for the enjoyment of players and supporters in the heart of our beautiful village.
Congratulations to the following winners – your cheques are in the post to you
- £250 : Tim Dodd
- £150 : Howard True
- £100 : Sally Bowes
- £75 : Lucy Vickery
- £50 : Roland Hamilton
If you have any queries about Club200, or would like to take part, please get in touch via email – wisboroughgreencenturyclub@gmail.com
Parking on Friday evening
Just a quick reminder about parking. We all look forward to our Juniors training sessions on Fridays, but with this comes a pressure on parking around the Green. We therefore ask you to walk to the Green if possible and be considerate when parking avoiding the verges around the playground area and Butts Meadow. Please also be mindful of the implication of your parking on the flow of traffic around the Green – we obviously want to avoid any unnecessary risks caused by the build-up of traffic. There is additional parking to be found in the Village Hall car park and Songhurst Meadow so please do make use of it if you can.
Honours Boards
Every week we recognise achievements of our players by including their names on our Honours Boards. We know how much our players both young and not so young enjoy seeing their names on the board and we would appeal to all parents to make sure that their children are shown the Honours Boards. The smile on their faces when they see their name on the board says it all ..
Congratulations to all the Under 7,6 5’s who have been recognised this week – how nice to have the Honours Board all to yourselves. Well done !
Information on each age group and registrations
We have a lot of useful information about our various age groups on our Juniors web page – Please click here
Existing members should have received their renewal emails a few weeks ago. If you missed the email and would like to register again this season, please let us know and we will resend the email to you.
New members can register via the Wisborough Green Sports MyClubhouse site by clicking here.
Kit
We have lots of information on our ‘Ordering Kit ‘ web page including a link to the Gray Nicholls Store online store where kit can be purchased. The web page includes some useful videos on how to choose the right junior bat , how to choose the right bat size and how much you should spend on a junior bat. We have also included details of helmet sizes and a pads size guide.
We have brought out a new range of hats for players to wear – slightly different colours for juniors (£10) , ladies (£12) and senior men (£15). We would like all players to wear the new Wisborough Green hats which enhances our identity as a team. Hats can be purchased from the BBQ guys on Friday evening.
Upcoming Fixtures
All of our age group fixtures are available on the ECB’s Playcricket website – please click here
Our under 10’s are kicking off the season with a game on the Green on Saturday morning against West Chiltington at 9:15 – please do come along and support them if you can.
Our Second X1 are playing Littlehampton on Saturday afternoon at 1pm and and our Sunday X1 have their first friendly Sunday home warmup game against Ancient Mariners starting at 2pm
Team selections
…and finally – spotted out and about …
Every week we like to finish off Wizzy News with something we can all have a chuckle about …
That’s it for this week.
If there is anything we need to know you know where to find us
Have a great cricketing week 🏏😊
Cheers
Wizzy