On 24th of October, Cricket Lester carried out a small survey of players who had played OC cricket in 2014 or 2015 but not in 2016 to see if it could discover something of the reasons why they had given up the sport. They were asked three [linked] questions.
[a] Why did you give up the sport. Ten responses were offered from emigration to stopping playing due to injury.
The second question they were asked related to whether or not they might play cricket again in 2017.
[c] The final question was for those who indicated that they might consider playing again and they were asked what would encourage them to do so. Again a number of options were offered covering facilities, format of games, travel distance social rather than competitive cricket and the spirit in which the sport was played.
The survey went out to around 800 players and just over 100 responded. In all there were responses from over 10% of the target audience, which given the nature of such surveys is not too bad but obviously the relatively small numbers need to be taken into account when reviewing the results of the survey.
In answer to the first question [to which multiple responses were allowed but most only gave one] about 25% citing emigration as the reason for not playing, about half said they did not have time to play due to work, family or social commitments and 35% said they gave up either because of the poor quality of grounds or poor player behaviour.
In response to the second question it was good to know that less than 14% said that they were not interested in playing cricket any more, while just under 38% responded that they might play again, subject to their concerns about the current set up being met. About half the respondents indicated that they could only take up cricket again if their personal circumstances changed.
The final question, which was only answered by those who answer YES to Q2, obviously had a much smaller number replying. Nonetheless it was still interesting the strong support for shorter matches [corresponding to the reasons for giving up in the first place], especially at weekends and the interest in social cricket. It is of course dangerous to read too much into the figures but a simple extrapolation of the responses to all that have given up playing in 2016 would suggest a fairly sizeable number of players might be enticed back into the sport or to rejoin their clubs if there was more T20 and / or social cricket.
The final part of the survey sought suggestions from respondents. There were 37 replies. A selection of some of these comments is set out below [some edited to exclude personal or club references]:
Cricket Ireland need to invest in infrastructure. moving back to Sydney they have public cricket nets in EVERY park that are better than any I saw in Ireland. need to encourage kids to just play and play and play.
I played through an era of rapid expansion, which was declared completely positive by the union. The acceptance of new clubs, often with poor playing facilities, diluted the quality and enjoyment of playing the game. There appeared for a period to be no standard that was too low in terms of grounds, pitches or dressing rooms to prevent entry into an LCU league.
Club fee for members is too high. Especially for ppl coming over from different parts of the world to earn their living. It should be reduced
There has to be more 2020 cricket to attract new players who then may wish to play longer version of game.
I think in general the sport is being run well (back when I was playing in 2013 anyway). The only bad bits I remember is some teams attitude towards the game and trying to win at all costs. I think even sanctions could be imposed for such teams that take away from the joy of the sport. Even though I'm not involved with the sport I'd still like to see it in a good way in years to come.
One area that was a problem when I was there was some of the 'one team clubs' playing in lower divisions (11/12) where frankly there were players who were at least Div 5 standard - this spoiled the game for everyone. (when a Div 12 opener reverse sweeps his first ball for six you know it's going to be a long day!)
Junior men's cricket is being totally ignored by officials and clubs in Leinster. Junior men's cricket is effectively subsiding other forms of the game with ridiculous membership fees for an inferior experience.
Coloured clothes and white/pink balls at all levels. A standard ball in all matches. All players to sign a play hard and play fair pledge.
Doing a great job guys, get a bit more focus on Twenty20 cricket and it's importance to the casual player and the numbers will keep going up i'm sure...
The behaviour of players deteriorated badly in the last 5 years. It became quite unpleasant to play with such an aggressive, unfriendly atmosphere.
There needs to be a local league (i.e. south Dublin/north Dublin etc. so small travelling time to other grounds) of 20/25/30 over cricket organized so the whole thing takes approximately 3 hours (half a day) where you are gone from your family. Having played a lot of junior league cricket, I would say at least half of 40 over plus cricket matches result in dot balls due to batsmen not playing shots/dead batting deliveries. In other words, I don't believe that having a reduced over league will necessarily impact on technical skills and make it a slog-fest; it will just encourage players to play more positively (e.g. turn what might be a dot ball into a single).
More t20 and more games that can have both adult and youth sides on a ground on the same day
Start games earlier at possibly 11am and make them all either 35 or 40 overs other than the top four divisions
More emphasis on highlighting the "spirit of cricket"
Establish a Metro league and a Provincial league below Division 6 as in rugby. Country teams and parks teams play in the Leinster leagues. Junior sides of Dublin based clubs go into the metro leagues.