NORTHOP HALL ahidden gem ...
Pitchcare Oceania’s Simon Kars talks about his ‘year out’ at Northop Hall Cricket Club in North Wales, as a player and groundsman
Cardiff and Swansea feeding Glamorgan CCC. But one should not disregard the clubs to the north-west, which possess some of the best pitches and playing surfaces seen for hundreds of miles around. One such cricket club is Northop Hall Cricket Club, located thirty miles west of Liverpool, just over the Welsh border. The club is the spiritual centre of the small village of Northop Hall, where lifelong members support the club through sheer dedication, passion and tradition, as well as the occasional pint or two.
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The club hosts several matches between Welsh Minor Counties, and was the chosen venue for the Wales MC v Middlesex NatWest clash in 1994. Middlesex captain Mike Gatting commented on the quality of the ground saying, “the pitch is better than Lord’s! It’s the best ground I’ve played on for a couple of years.”
2008 was the club’s centenary year, and a whole week of celebrations to mark the occasion included an exhibition match against the world’s oldest and most famous cricket club - Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), with
outh Wales has always been regarded as the hotbed of Welsh cricket, with big clubs around
Australia’s Callum Ferguson in their line-up, and an 8-a-side competition against Lashings, with big names such as Alvin Kallicharran, Allan Mullally and Chris Harris taking part. During the summer of 2008 I played for the club as a semi-professional, flying all the way from sunny Melbourne, Australia to play for their 1st and 2nd XI teams, competing in the Liverpool and District Competition. As well as playing cricket, the club employed me as assistant groundsman over the playing season, due to my experience as a greenkeeper at Riversdale Golf Club back in Melbourne. It was an area of turf management I hadn’t experienced, but I was looking forward to learning the methods and procedures employed by Head Groundsman, George Groves. I first met George during the first week of my trip - in the bar, Well, I am Australian! He was enjoying a pint of ale and socialising with other life members. I sat with George (with my own pint of lager) to introduce myself and find out what he expected of me. From that point we became good mates, creating the foundations of a great working relationship at the club. George isn’t paid a penny for his countless hours of work on the ground
each week. He does it out of pure love and passion for the club. His down to earth attitude and dedication continues to produce high quality cricket pitches and playing surfaces every season. The clay based outfield is far from the conventional sand based outfields, but the results are of the highest quality, with drainage rarely becoming an issue. A mixture of different turf grass species are established over all playing surfaces, which include chewings fescue, browntop bent, perennial ryegrass and annual meadow grass.
The clay loam wicket is
approximately 12 pitches in width which are used for senior fixtures, with two more provisional pitches used on the east and west sides of the wicket when junior fixtures are played. The outfield is surrounded by a white picket fence which reflects the character and tradition of the club, along with clubhouse and viewing areas overlooking the city of Liverpool. The wicket, on many occasions, has been described as a batsman’s dream and, subsequently, a bowler’s nightmare! Apart from the odd wet wicket, when rain has been prolific prior to a match, the consistency of the pitches prepared are second to none,
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