After almost 2/3rds of our uni cricket club graduated last year, we were left with a situation where there was only 4 of us who were in a position to run the club, therefore we became the committee by default. Since the start of the year there's been a lot of problems and unnecessary stress which culminated in last night where our coach sulked because he was batting last in a net session (which is obviously meant to be for players, but more on that later)
Our first job was to secure a new first year students to bolster our numbers, as after last year we were left with about 8/9 regular members. As a result we were far too lenient on paying membership fees (which are £50 a year with no subs at all, not bad for 30 weeks indoor training, and free games if selected). Normally the policy is to give one free taster training session, and then not allow them to train until they pay their share. We ended up with people turning up on week 5 and getting arsey when they were told they couldn't train. We had people tell us week after week that they would 'pay before next week' and then yet another 'money issue' would pop up. We then finally told the lads 'ok no worries, come back in a couple of weeks when you can pay' and it's amazing that all of them miraculously found the money to pay at the same time!
Our second issue was selection for the indoor league. We had two sets of games a month or so apart, and selected our teams based on commitment and ability. Some lads who hadn't been to training were arguably better cricketers than the lads that were selected, and couldn't work out why coming to 1 out of 5 training sessions didn't warrant selection. We also base commitment not only on training but on 'socials' (basically, like every other sports club in uni, half our funding comes from bars, on the condition that we bring a certain number of people to their bar every other Wednesday) Half our club haven't bothered to come despite constant reminders, leaving the dependable among us to make up the numbers by any means including dragging non-cricket mates out with us.
And lastly we have our farcical situation with our 'coach' who finished uni last year and insisted on coaching us. He put on a few drills in the first few weeks and since then has been using the 2 hours as a winter net session for himself. Last night i overheard him telling someone once he'd batted he was off, so i held of and made sure he was the last one to bat, which led to him sulking and refusing to give me and another lad a lift home (which is directly on his way home). We've decided as a committee that if he carries on using us as his excuse to bat that we will tell him to pay membership seeing as he wants to be treated as regular player. However, he is also our key to getting cheaper local ground hire/umpires as he's a local lad who 'knows' absolutely everyone.
How on earth do we proceed with this situation? tell him to pay and risk stretching our finances further if he tells his club not to let us rent the ground? or bite or tongues and continue to let him do whatever he wants at training?
Apologies if this has been a bit of an incoherent rant, but it's had me in a (No Swearing Please) mood all day and none of us have any idea what to do with the situation.
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Topic: Uni Cricket Organisation (Read 1916 times)