Oxfordshire Cricket have sought to enhance its  Bulls (Boys) and Falcons (Girls) programmes that provide targeted levelling up opportunities for state-educated children within the pathway programme. The supplementary programmes for state-educated children are funded entirely by the Oxfordshire Cricket Board (OCB) financial reserves and our fundraising campaigns. In 2023-24, we have again invested substantially in the Bulls and Falcons programmes to provide free, and accessible coaching and match play opportunities that help to ‘level up the playing field’ between the independent and state school sectors. 

In the three months prior to Christmas 2023 we delivered 54 hours of Bulls and Falcons provision to 165 state-educated children in school years 6, 7 and 8 who were participants within phase one of our pathway programme. In the knowledge that aspiring state-school girls have even less access to cricket than boys, we scaled the supplementary programmes so that it offered 6-8 hours of additional contact time per player for the girls (Falcons) and  3-4 hours of additional contact time per player for the boys (Bulls). 

As we turn to the New Year, we will again be delivering a Bulls and Falcons programme to all state-educated children that have participated in the 2023-24 pathway programme, within the Under 10 to Under 13 age groups. Through the months of January, February and March 2024, the supplementary support will remain accessible to all individuals, irrespective of the selection outcomes at the conclusion of phase 1 within the pathway programme. 

You can find out more about the Bulls and Falcons programmes on our website HERE. 

Oxfordshire Cricket would like to invite you and other interested representatives from your club, school or association to our Cricket Development Evening (CDE) that will take place on Monday 26th February 2024 from 18.00-21:00 at St Edward’s School in Oxford.  

The Cricket Development Evening is a great opportunity for clubs, schools, partners and associations to come together. This event is free to attend, to help support the development of cricket. Members of the Oxfordshire Cricket workforce, the ECB and our partners will also be in attendance. Local authority officers and executive members with responsibility for sport and playing pitch strategies have also been invited with the purpose of networking and developing better relationships with clubs. 

We are delighted to announce that Richard Gould – CEO at the England and Wales Cricket Board will be making a keynote speech as part of the evening where he will discuss the health of cricket, impact of Inspiring Generations and the changing landscape of cricket. Richard has significant leadership experience from major organisations across sport, having served as CEO at first Somerset County Cricket Club and then Surrey County Cricket Club, before going on to be the CEO of Bristol City Football Club.

Workshops Available:

Attendees will have the option to select two workshops to attend out of five. The information about the workshops is as follows:

1. Facilities, Grants and Funding – Neil Higginson (ECB) and Keith Cowley (Oxfordshire Cricket). Neil is one of four ECB Facilities Planning Managers in the Recreational Game, Neil covers the SW & Wales. He works closely with many stakeholders in supporting the delivery of facility projects ranging from new grounds, pavilions and practice facilities to create welcoming environments. We have also invited all the officers from each local authority to attend.
2. Play-Cricket – Chris Seal (ECB) – This workshop will be an overview of Play-Cricket. It will be an opportunity to get new people on board and set up to play cricket (i.e admin adding coaches to score) then showing them how to access matches, add team sheets in advance up until opening up the matches to score. There will also be a question and answer section built into the workshop
3. Volunteer Recruitment – (ECB) This workshop will look at ways to engage and capture a new generation of volunteers through launching a Young Leaders Programme 
4. Boundary Programme – Anti Discrimination Training – If you are involved in recreational cricket and you want to know more about types of discrimination, how to manage complaints, how to report to the ECB and how the ECB can support you then the boundary programme is for you. This is aimed at club officials, league officials and County development officers.
5. Cricket in Secondary Schools – Ed Wilson and Nick Holroyd (Oxfordshire Cricket)  This workshop will explore how we can create a strategy for school cricket and in particular secondary schools in the County. This includes exploring what a programme can look like, how we can work together to get children transitioning to clubs, as well as work with the Oxfordshire Schools Cricket Association

Refreshments

Refreshments will be provided in the form of drinks and light food 

Timings of the Evening 

Partners

There will be pop ups from our partners in the lobby areas as you arrive which will include but not limited to:

• Flicx
• Serious Cricket
• Leonardo Royal Hotel 
• Chadlington Brewery 
• Officials Association

Address: St Edward’s School, Woodstock Rd, Oxford OX2 7NN

Book Your Place –  Click Here to Book

Parking: Parking takes place on ‘Field Side’ of school (Postcode for Sat Nav is OX2 7NZ). The ‘Field Side Entrance’ off the Woodstock Road has a St Edward’s School entrance sign as well as a Nuffield Health sign. The main car park is number 10 on the map and it is a gravel car park, but there is parking before there along the edge of the Netball/Tennis Courts (number 46) and in between the courts and the astro pitches. People will need to walk from the car park round the playing fields and under the pedestrian tunnel (number 55) to ‘Quad side’. There will be signage to guide attendees to the Olivier Hall. Please click here to see the attached map

We hope to see you there!

Further information will be released closer to the date. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact us

Oxfordshire Cricket will again host open sessions for its Women and Men’s teams that will take place during the preparation phase between January and March 2024. We are now welcoming expressions of interest from eligible, high-performing, or high-potential adult players who have the ambition to represent Oxfordshire.

Our aim is for our Women and Men’s teams to deliver competitive and repeated, long-term performance achievements and to be populated by players developed via our pathway, from Clubs, Schools and Universities within the County, along with other eligible adult players who may play the game outside of Oxfordshire. The open sessions assist the identification, development and recruitment of eligible adult players and help us to capture talent that may have emerged at a later developmental stage. 

We remain committed to ensuring that adult players’ continue to strive for representative selection and the open sessions will provide an accessible opportunity for individuals to demonstrate their capability to represent Oxfordshire. The open sessions are being hosted for eligible adult players (eighteen years of age or above who are not within a pathway programme) and we are now welcoming expressions of interest from eligible individuals who fulfil one or more of the talent identification criteria below;

• A high-performing adult player whose performances within a Premier or Division 1 Cricket League over previous seasons have been above, or significantly above their peers.
• A high-potential adult player with the belief that they have the potential to perform at the more advanced stage of representing Oxfordshire within National Counties Cricket.
• An adult player who has a standout strength or point of difference either within a specific skill discipline or within the white or red ball format.

The Open Sessions for the County Women and Men’s will take place independently and have been scheduled on the following dates between January and March 2024.

• County Women – Sunday 28th January 2024 and Sunday 25th February 2024
• County Men – Sunday 14th January 2024 and Sunday 11th February 2024

Adult players who would like to attend the upcoming open sessions should complete the Expression of Interest Form. Applicants will then be contacted directly with further information and joining instructions ahead of the open sessions.

More detailed information about our County Women and County Men’s team can be found on our website HERE.