Well, what can I say about my look back on 2020? It was like no other season I can remember. Everything was looking good until March, when Coronavirus (Covid-19) hit. The country was placed in lockdown with all sport suspended. It looked for a long time that there would be no cricket played, but in July we were given the go ahead to re-start with a few precautions (no use of changing rooms, sanitization breaks and bring your own teas.) I would like to thank the E.C.B. & Cricket Wales for keeping us up to date with all the latest developments. Also, thank you to Keri Chahal the Area Cricket Manager for South West Wales, who drew up the cluster groups of up to 6 local teams to play matches, which was a great success. With no local football or rugby, cricket was played well into September.
As clubs were keen to play as much cricket as possible, we decided to run the T20 cup competitions. There were 27 entries for the Senior Cup and 21 for the Intermediate Cup. Finals Day was held in the middle of September. Thanks to Gorseinon again for working hard to get the ground ready. Restrictions in place at the time meant that unfortunately, no spectators were allowed. First up was the Intermediate Final. In a low scoring game Mumbles ‘A’, who had lost their last 3 previous finals, beat Pontarddulais off the last ball of the match.
In the Senior Final, which was also a low scoring affair, Swansea hit a four off the last ball to beat Clydach and claim the new “Bernard Hastie” trophy.
We also managed to get our annual fixture against the M.C.C. started. We took a wicket in the first over, but sadly, the match was rained off with less than 4 overs competed. I would like to thank Pontarddulais for their valiant effort during the day.
With clubs having little or no income we decided that the SWCA would pay clubs Cricket Wales membership for 2020 & 2021, also membership of the Association would cover the same 2-year period. Over half the clubs have paid their membership.
With a lot of clubs having decided they wanted to wear coloured clothing, we had decided in February to order red Sovereign & League Specials for the season. We have a lot of balls in stock, but we decided that for the 2021 season teams in Division 1 only, would use the pink Readers Sovereign and then we would review their use at the end of the season.
I would like to thank our sponsors Peter Lynn and Partners for their continued support, also EV2 Sportswear who provided us with the coloured kit for the league team, and Neil Pullen of Readers.
During the pandemic we had to make sure we could carry on as best we could. Monthly meetings were firstly held on Microsoft Teams and then on Zoom. We held our first virtual A.G.M. in December.
I want to thank our Secretary Steve Jones and our Treasurer Allan Winkley for keeping the Association running during the year.
We appointed Ben Roberts to the role of League Welfare Officer. This role has expanded recently. Brian Jones, the Premier League Welfare Officer is to also cover all teams in Division 1. Can I thank them both for keeping us up to date with all the latest welfare issues?
We were able to postpone our Annual Presentation Dinner and the guest speaker for 12 months, so hopefully on Friday 1^st October 2021 we will again be holding our Presentation Dinner at the Towers Hotel.
We have some new teams for 2021. Tata Steel 3^rd & 4^th XI’s and the Wildboar Centurions (who play at Ammanford recreation ground).
With a Covid vaccine now on the horizon, I hope everybody stays safe and that things can get back to normal (or as normal as possible) in 2021.