Jan Nuijten is a long-standing member of HCC and a prominent recreational cricketer. He captained the fourth team which won the Division 2A championship in 2007.

It is with pleasure that I take up your invitation to give my views on this topic. First a reaction to Fred’s points.

1.Too short a season
Fred takes an expanding football season as a given. I think that’s correct, although I also believe that the smaller summer associations ought to try to join forces and discuss this with the larger associations with a view to establishing a clear division between winter sports and summer sports (from 1 May to 1 September). But the loss of 6-8 weeks to the summer vacation is also virtually a given. (Youth) cricket faces three problems: no fields, (therefore) no players, and no leaders (parents who understand cricket; we have 15 million football coaches).

If this trend continues, you can do two things: pack as much cricket as possible into those few weeks, midweek games and touring. HCC and other clubs can do more here. The other is to view cricket as a completely separate sport: so, no longer with football, hockey etc. alongside. But how many cricketers would we then retain? An alternative is for the real cricket lovers to extend the season with a separate competition with a mix of clubs in April and September, played on cricket-only grounds (Voorburg. VRA etc.). The KNCB and the clubs should experiment with such an ‘English’ extension of the season.

2. Retaining the youth
In addition to the problems identified under 1 (youngsters choose football), many people find cricket unattractive because of the length of matches. Shorter matches, Twenty20, might be a solution. The KNCB and the clubs should work this out in detail: shorter matches can also be played on midweek evenings.

It’s also worth observing that the policy of the KNCB (points 3 and 4 below) is being copied at HCC: disproportionately more attention for the top (youth), the rest just tag along. I believe that any sport, including cricket, only has the right to exist if the top is supported by a broad, recreational base: you also need people to watch the top matches? And you need eleven players on the field? The talented youth players will stay anyway, because they get a chance in every game, and get extra training at HCC as well as with the KNCB: the Academy, which is really far too heavily directed towards batting, and not enough towards bowlers, especially spinners. Of course there has to be attention for the better youth and boys have to be prepared for the first team, but I also urge attention for both groups of cricketers.

3. The influence of foreigners
It is indeed true that the influence of foreign players has become too great in recent years. One ensures a higher level of play, but the clubs drive each other crazy with ever-more variants of overseas and exchange players. This does indeed work at the cost of the promotion of juniors, and this too is evidence of one-sided attention to the top. With all due respect to the other players and the results we have gained, but apart from the coach and the exchange player no other player of HCC 2 has really made runs: throw players to the lions and teach them to take responsibility.

4.The KNCB and the national side
Indeed, the KNCB also gives disproportionate attention to the top at the expense of the domestic competition. On the other hand, without the successes of the national side there would be absolutely no funding gained, and not for recreational cricket either. So 10% for recreational cricket is maybe better than nothing? A dilemma. But the KNCB must certainly allocate its funds more ‘sustainably’, and be able to defend the view that specific investments in the base will pay off in the long term, and are better than short-lived successes at the top.

5.The Dutch competition
Last year was really awful, but you can see the dilemma under point 4. Don’t let’s just blame the KNCB, but use our influence through Jeroen Smits, involved with the national side, and Willem Winckel, the Board member with responsibility for recreational cricket – and of course, at KNCB general meetings as well.

6.The competition complicated?
Last year was certainly extreme, with play-offs and then more play-offs. Again the principle applies: let’s use our influence. There is consultation with the Topklasse and Hoofdklasse clubs, and they must produce a sensible competition structure.

Playing shorter matches is certainly a good idea, and is already happening. Did Fred mean two matches one after the other on the same day? The teams playing second would then finish very late, which is not great, certainly on Sunday.

Fred fears a decline to Zami level. In the first place, that wouldn’t be so bad, and Zami cricket is great for the life of the club! A bit more seriously: I would argue that HCC 1 and 2 must survive in the club as well as the Zami. I shall conclude with a few additional points.

A.
In addition to retaining our juniors, we also need to hold on to our seniors! They are needed to train up the youth on Sundays. That happens too seldom, and it seems even worse at HCC than at other clubs. Top players say after many years’ service in HCC 1 and 2: we are going to stop completely and go and play golf. It really is essential that older, more experienced players continue for a few seasons in order to play on Sundays with the juniors; not every Sunday necessarily, so that there’s also time for golf!

B.
How important does Kon. HC&VV; find it that cricket and football exist beside each other (I leave tennis and squash out of the discussion)? They are unmistakably becoming increasing separate worlds, and football demands an ever-greater role. Cricket is, as it were, tolerated, and not always sincerely. I believe this is a key question for the club. Personally I find the combination of great importance, otherwise we would become just another football club. But do we all really agree?

C.
In view of the increasingly overlapping seasons and the ever-smaller overlap as players of HCC and HVV members, the step of creating a separate cricket ground (with a turf square) ought to be investigated. Advantages: you would be less in each others’ way, a turf square is the future. Disadvantages: such a ground could not be found in the immediate neighbourhood, the synergy between cricket and football would disappear entirely, the grounds and clubhouse at De Diepput would be less used in the summer, or completely empty. At the moment there are more disadvantages, but there might be a ground possible on the other side of the Alkemadelaan in Clingendael? It has been investigated before, and it seems utopian, but it would be the best solution of all.

I hope this is, along with Fred’s cry from the heart, a further impetus to think about the future of cricket and the club, with achievable and somewhat less achievable (but not impossible!) proposals.