The long-term future looks bright for Kyneton Cricket Club.
With the club’s senior teams negotiating their second season in the Gisborne and District Cricket Association after switching competitions, club secretary Rob Bye said it was an interesting period.
He said the club was seeing heartening juniors growth, having gone from three to seven junior sides in recent years. With that, progress was flowing through to the seniors.
“We’re sort of growing from the bottom up,” he said. “A lot of clubs in the area lose their players in the 17 to 24 age bracket and rely on the young kids and older guys still playing.
“We lost a lot of older guys and have managed to retain the younger guys. In the last game before Christmas, our senior side had an age range of 16 to 24. We’re incredibly proud that the club has been able to retain our players.”
After making the 2016-17 C-grade semi-finals in its first GDCA season, Kyneton was given another challenge with the move up to B grade.
Heading into the Christmas break, Kyneton had a win and tie from six matches.
Bye said the results didn’t tell the whole story.
“We knew it would be tough this season,” he said. “The aim as a club is to eventually get into McIntyre Cup.
“This season we’ve been competitive without getting the results. In most games, we’ve had good periods of play, but we haven’t been able to put it all together.
“There’s less of a gap between the first and the seconds and that’s where the improvement has come from.”
Bye said the first XI’s first win, against Bacchus Marsh before the Christmas break, couldn’t have come at a better time.
“It was an incredibly well-played match with everyone performing,” he said. “There were some standout performances … the bowlers all backed each other up and the fielders did the same. The batsmen then got the job done.”
Bye said the key to getting more wins in the second half of the season would be greater consistency.
“The guys are putting in the hard work,” he said. “We’re starting to find a nice balance.”
Kyneton’s return to the field after the Christmas break was delayed because of high temperatures on Saturday. All GDCA matches were postponed until February 4.
Kyneton will face Macedon in a one-dayer this week.
