Tom James reports on the Head Groundsman of Midhurst Cricket Club who is providing ....
A touch of Glass
Nestled in the medieval village of Midhurst, and bordering Cowdray Park polo club, is one of the gems of Britain’s local cricket tradition. The protected Tudor ruins of Cowdray House set a striking backdrop to Midhurst Cricket Club in West Sussex - surely one rivalled by only a handful of grounds. No surprise then to learn that Midhurst was voted one of the loveliest cricket grounds in the country by Wisden, the game’s Bible - pipped for top county honours only by Arundel Cricket Club, which sits in the grounds of the internationally renowned castle, the home to the Duke and Duchess of Norfolk. Picture postcard scenery aside, the task of maintaining a village cricket square is not an easy one as budgets and, more importantly, time are factors that ground staff often don’t have at their disposal.
Despite its somewhat isolated location, Midhurst enjoys a large membership with three Saturday league sides playing in the Hampshire Cricket League pyramid and the County Division 1; a Sunday league side and two evening sides who play in a local mid-week league, as well as a thriving youth section made up of juniors as young as six. With such a packed programme,
regular maintenance is crucial to keep the pitch intact. The man in charge of
the - some would say thankless - task of ensuring Midhurst’s square does justice to its stunning surroundings is 49-year- old Peter Glass. Currently in his twelfth year in the post as voluntary head groundsman at the club, he has now become the first man in the club’s history to take up the position permanently. “The ground was in a reasonable state before I joined but, since I’ve been working at it regularly, we’ve seen some marked improvements,” Peter states, “especially over the last couple of years. I try to spend at least 14 to16 hours a week, doing a little every day if I can.” Peter began his career working on a voluntary basis maintaining the sports pitches at Chichester Hospital in West Sussex, developing his avid interest in greenkeeping after relocating to the cathedral city in the 1980s.
He moved to Midhurst in 1996 where he became involved with the club almost immediately, captaining the second XI for three years and holding the post of club chairman between 2004 and 2006.
Upon taking responsibility for
groundsmanship, Peter came up against a familiar scenario for all voluntary staff - elderly machinery and little, if any, maintenance budget. “Some of the kit was more than 35 years old,” he recalls, “which made my job a little
tougher. We have no real budget so any new machinery we want has to be bought with money we’ve either applied for through the English and Welsh Cricket Board (ECB), or from money that we can raise ourselves.” To date, Peter has performed splendidly, managing to raise between £80,000 and £90,000 for the club, a tidy sum that has helped them make much needed purchases and undertake essential maintenance work.
The appliance of science may well be today’s watchwords in turf management but Peter stresses that there is definitely an art to nurturing a pitch with limited time and money.
“It’s all down to doing the right things at the right time,” he reveals. “I’m very much part of the old school, sticking to what I know works best.” He remains sceptical about the growing scientific emphasis to the job. “I feel it can be over complicated,” he argues. “In my mind, there’s little substitute for experience in this business.” One of Peter's former day jobs was as
a director of a UK charity, a position he believes has helped him greatly in sourcing funding for the club. The ECB’s machinery fund is one such avenue, designed for smaller clubs to apply to for financial support. But it’s not always an easy route.
“The only problem is the tortuous and time-consuming process you often have
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