Indoor League
Strathie's indoor league season came to end on Wednesday night with 2 defeats, rounding off a season to forget for the Strathie 6. Strathie are tied for last place in the league with Dundee University (who have a couple of games left to play next week).
Nets come to Forfar
The opening of the new community campus means that we no longer need to travel for pre-season net practise. Our first session in the new facility took place on 26th February with a decent turn-out of players being put through their paces by James Colhoun. Pre-season continues this Sunday (5th) from 1-3pm at the campus.
Overseas Player
Everything is going well with the recruitment of our overseas amateur for this season. He is Chris Stevenson and he's looking forward to joining us. Chris is a right-handed top order batsman and Chinaman/googly bowler, who comes highly recommended by the same sources that put us in touch with the two T's (Thiart & Theo).
New Initiative in Junior Cricket
We have signed up to be participants in a new major initiative in junior cricket - All Stars Cricket - soon to be launched by Cricket Scotland and the ECB. Details are still embargoed until the national press launch in mid-March, but it's safe to say that this is the biggest innovation in junior cricket since the introduction of Kwik Cricket - so it's great to be in on the ground floor. If it delivers against it's ambitions and targets, it will increase the numbers of youngsters whose first love is cricket and bring new parent volunteers to the club.
Fixtures for the new Season
We have our first team fixtures and you can find these on the website. We're not quite at that stage yet with the 2nd team. The Strathmore & Perthshire Union has just finalised a new structure for the development league that our second team plays in and will be releasing fixtures shortly. The change in structure reduces the number of league fixtures so we will be looking as much as possible to fill the free Sundays with friendlies. Watch this space...
Membership Fees
It's almost time again for the annual collection of membership fees. Given our drop in junior membership last year, we will be targeting juniors, parents and families and looking to offer some new incentives to join.
Dolphin Race
We held our first ever dolphin race night last Saturday night (25th Feb). A bit different to our usual race nights, it was a hugely entertaining evening and raised over £700 for the club. A big thank you to Jenny and Lisa for organising, to Chris Duke for MC-ing the evening and to everyone that contributed by either buying a dolphin, sponsoring a race or coming along on the night.
Cricket Force
This years Cricket Force will focus around the weekend of 8th & 9th April 2017. We are already developing a job list - a mixture of improvements and general maintenance. Last year we placed a value of well over £2k on the work done by members and friends of the club. This year we want to do even better.
Over the next few weeks committee members will be approaching people to assist generally and with specific tasks - but don't wait to be asked. If you are available to help out at any point that weekend - or indeed any other time - let us know. Leave information at the bar, contact Andy Sturrock or email strathmorecc@hotmail.com
Funding Plans
As you know we have some ambitious plans for developing and improving our facilities over the next few years. To do that, we will be undertaking a lot of fundraising activity.
We now have a funding plan - in which we have matched our plans with possible grant funding sources and are about to start applying. There's a lot of work in this. If you have skills in writing or finance, your assistance would be very welcome.
We are also about to dip our toe in to the world of crowd funding and will be launching our campaign in mid-May.
Dates for your Diary
- 24 Hour Pool Marathon
- Friday 31st March/Saturday 1st April 2017
- ForfarFest and Gala Week
- We're looking to play our part in the week of activities currently being planned for ForfarFest and Gala Week. Our plan is to run a fun event at the club on Saturday 17th June 2017. There will be plenty of activities to join in. If you've any suggestions for inclusion in the fun day, let us know.
- Bag Pack
- We're trying a bag pack this year. The date is Saturday 16th September and the venue Tesco in Forfar. We'll need plenty of helpers, so get the date in your diary now