New cricket ‘team’ sets season’s goals

Exciting times lie ahead for Amanzimtoti Cricket Club (ACC) with a new chairman at the helm.

Johan Bothma was elected as chairman at the club’s recent annual general meeting and he is keen to take the club back into the Premier League.

“Currently we play in stream one. Toti has the talent to get back into the Premier League, but unfortunately we are losing players,” said Johan.

The new committee comprises of chairman Johan Bothma, secretary Gerda Bothma, treasurer Craig Chamier, ACC team management Paul Wilson, team administrator Pieter Venter, asset and facility control Rex Hindman, and communication and liaison, Collin Jones.

“We will hold a meeting soon and we want players to come and listen to what we have to say. We have a new vision and new goals. The second thing we want to concentrate on is better communication within the club. We also want to revitalise the club’s website and send out a regular electronic newsletter.”

The club will concentrate on getting junior players to join the club. “We want to get schools involved and set up meetings with principals.” The idea is to field two U11 and U13 sides.

“We also want to appoint team managers and ensure the club doesn’t clash with the schools. We have retained some of the old skill on the new committee in Rex, Craig, Peter and Collin.”

One of the problems Johan will focus on is to extend practise times for those players who work out of town.

“We hope to have floodlights installed at the nets, so practice times can extend beyond 6pm. We also want two new covers for the pitches.

The team finished second in the league last season because many games were called off as the pitch at the golf course was not covered. We also want to upgrade boundary ropes.”

Johan believes the first team players deserve more prestige. “Currently there’s no honour to play for Toti’s first team. We want to change that and get the players proper kit and sponsored T-shirts. I also want them to coach with me at local schools.”

With the club in negotiations with sponsors, structured practices, sponsored floodlights and fields, and an enthusiastic new chairman at the helm, the start of the 2013/14 season looks promising for Toti Cricket Club.