Club Cricket Academy is very proud to be hosting the Havering youth squad in their lead up to the finals.
For the first time in a number of years, both the boys and girls Havering cricket sides have made it through to the Finals of the London Youth Games.
Cricket has returned in full to the London Youth Games in 2022 after the games didn’t take place at all in 2020 and then a reduced cricket programme was included in 2021 as the Covid pandemic made life difficult for the competition organisers.
For both boys and girls this year’s cricket event was aimed at U13s (Y8 pupils and below) and players on County programmes were not permitted to take part in the event in order to make the competition as accessible and inclusive as possible. In Havering, Pete Reynolds of Rainham CC took on the role of managing both of the sides and Pete used performances from the newly formed Havering Indoor Junior League to help put together two squads. After some further trials and training sessions the two squads were finalised.
The boys were first up in qualifying, and won four of their five games in their pool which took place at Harrow, to finish second in the table and advance to the Finals Day at Lords. A week later and the girls were in action, and they recovered from losing their first two matches to pick up two victories in their next two contests. After nearly an hour long wait for other results to come in, the girls were confirmed in third spot in their group and this meant they claimed the last spot at Finals Day. Both sides will be heading to Lords on March 26th to take on the seven other remaining Boroughs.
Pete and his team of assistant coaches from Rainham CC, as well as Angela Green of Upminster CC, have done a tremendous job with both squads. They have fostered a superb team spirit amongst both squads, and there have been players from six clubs within the Borough represented in the Havering sides, showing the breadth of talent and the enthusiasm there is for the game in the area.
The Club Cricket Academy is pleased to be able to host the squads’ final two training sessions over the next two weeks. We hope these sessions will help to give both sides a final boost ahead of their big day out at Lords at the end of the month.