New LCU clubs

Firehen

Interesting to see how the new teams fared.

It's fair to say that whoever made the decisions regarding what divisions these teams were placed in didn't do a stellar job. 5 of the 6 teams finishing in the top or bottom two by big margins.

Having played in Division 12 and 14 this year, I've experienced 2 of these teams first hand. Greystones were clearly too good for Division 12. No idea why their players would even want to compete at that level.

Clonee 2 we played 3 times. The first was a nail biter, the last we were beaten fairly and comprehensively but in the other match we were ripped apart by a lad who was their unstarred 1st player. Looking at a few of the scorecards from their 1sts (in Division 6), it was obvious he was a decent bat at that level, making a few 50s this year and mostly batting in the top or middle of the lineup. The fact that they played him in a Division 14 match was shocking. I realise they only have two teams and are a new club starting out, but they have a deep enough pool of players not to pull a stunt like that. Even if it is technically within the rules, it's unfair on the opposing team.

Still, it is good to see new clubs emerging and I wish them all good luck in their sophmore season when they are (hopefully) competing in divisions more to their standard.

djimi

Noone from Division 6 should be playing in Division 14; I dont care how many teams a club has or how they can work the starring. The rules of starring state that even if a player is not starred they should not be playing below their level. I would argue that where a team only has two teams in Divisions 6 and 14 none of their 1sts should be eligable to playing on their 2nds as there is too much of a difference in standard.

Judging where to put new teams can be tricky. I remember a few years ago playing in Junior C against Dundrum (or Swaglok as they were at the time) when they first came into the league. They were easily Inter A/B standard that season but by the time it became obvious it was too late to change them. Im not really sure what the answer is to improve it though; maybe in the case of Division 12 from this season there is a case to ignore Greystones (move them to their correct level) and just promote 2nd and 3rd instead. Hard to know really.

prettygurrly

crackit wrote: »

Also prettygurly would you not play on a league team? I've played on teams with women before. Is it offputting to have to play with men rather than a ladies XI?

no I have played on men's teams before, particularly in college in the early days of our team when I was the 9th or 10th player on the team.

I'm now in TCD so hopefully we'll get a few games this year.

When I was travelling up and down to Dublin 3 times a week I was in my teens when there were no teams in Wicklow, even men's teams

Cots

TheDrog wrote: »

1. Greystones originally to be in Div9 (Division 12) 1st/8 92.44% winners ahead of Wexford 74.22%

2. Clonee Division unchanged (Division 6) 7th/8 22.18% relegated ahead of Old Belvo 21.20% and behind Rush 3 38.00%

3. Clonee 2 Division unchanged (Division 14) 2nd/9 77.19% promoted behind Dundrum 3 84.49% ahead of Mullingar 3 56.36%

4. Ring Commons originally to be in Div10 (Division 13) 1st/9 82.15% winners ahead of Leinster 7 73.00%

5. Cabinteely Division unchanged (Division 10) 8th/8 25.82% relegated with Pembroke 5 29.54%

6. Swords originally to be in Div 11(Divison 10) 3rd/8 50.83% remain in division behind Sandyford 2 68.73% and ahead of Malahide 5 45.16%

I only played against one of these teams this season but still feel the comment is necessary.. this team, when we played them at least, cheated their way to losing both games by seriously big margains, with stupidly awful umpiring which was done purely on purpose with the one ambition of winning, one win was by 6 wickets with about 9 overs to spare at a canter and by about 70-80 runs in the other. This was very frustrating for us and when someone gets hit on the full infront of middle and doesnt have to go you can imagine how much verbals occur in the aftermath. Fair enough we hammered them but what about the close games that they won, that team if they played fairly would not even be up to div 10 standard yet by cheating were able to retain their place in div 6 for next season, this is something which needs to be gotten rid of because there's no way a team should be allowed to survive miles above their standard purely by cheating when they're umpiring their own batting innings

djimi

This kind of carry on happens quite a bit unfortunately; Id say most cricketers in the lower leagues at least will have plenty of stories to tell about dodgy umpiring and awful decisions ruining games. Im not sure what the solution is really; its not practical to provide neutral umpires for 14 divisions, and they tried to introduce a system whereby the teams themselves provide a "neutral" (ie non playing) umpire, but it just proved unworkable (as anyone who has captained a lower league side will tell you it can be hard enough to get 11 players on a given day, let alone a 12th who will be willing to umpire for 80/90 overs!).

To a certain extent you have to just go on good faith that the majority of cricketers and teams are willing to abide by the rules and play within the laws and spirit of the game, and that most people want to have a fair game with a fair outcome. Thankfully, for the most part this is still true, and when something does happen you just have to keep reporting teams in the hope that the evidence against a cheating side will mount up and action will have to be taken.

Cots

That new rule brought in would have made things even worse as they could have an umpire muck up both your batting and bowling, I'm not asking for miracles but if it's hitting halfway up middle or the man is run out/stumped by a yard and a half and it's not given that's just blatant cheating. I know it's a bit prejudice but if there's going to be trouble in a lower league game it would make sense to appoint umpires to it rather than to a game in the division above where there wont be any trouble if they were left to umpire it by themselves

djimi

You can request branch umpires for a lower league game and if one is available then you might have a chance. If there is a reason to think that there may be trouble at a game then you could make a very good arguement for having branch umpires appointed.

The problem is that for the most part its hard to tell when there is going to be blatant cheating, and considering the cost involved in reqesting branch umpires most clubs are not going to bother for lower league games.

It is a big problem with league cricket and its something that has been/is being looked at, but there really is no easy answer. For the most part these cases come down to one teams/captains word against another, and there is no real way of adjudicating on such cases. Best thing to do really is for teams to keep reporting these teams in the hope that if enough people complain the LCU will have no option but to investigate further.

TrueDub

Please keep this discussion on a general level - specific incidents are not to be discussed. If a club has concerns with the conduct of another, please raise it with the appropriate body, Cricket Leinster. Thanks.

Cots

TrueDub wrote: »

Please keep this discussion on a general level - specific incidents are not to be discussed. If a club has concerns with the conduct of another, please raise it with the appropriate body, Cricket Leinster. Thanks.

What is the point not sharing experiences, apologies for using the name but what difference does it really make, anyone else who has had the experience against that team would know who I'm talking about. Blatant cheating is out there and really should be stopped because it is incredibly frustrating and for the record, both incidents were reported so dont start that at me

djimi : I know you can do so but at this stage with my team anyways whoever does this seemed to tell all the umpires that there's trouble anytime we play which was wrong as they were the only games we had trouble in which meant that we and not that team got given umpires for the rest of our season

TrueDub

Cots wrote: »

What is the point not sharing experiences, apologies for using the name but what difference does it really make, anyone else who has had the experience against that team would know who I'm talking about. Blatant cheating is out there and really should be stopped because it is incredibly frustrating and for the record, both incidents were reported so dont start that at me

As I said to you by PM, there are ways of dealing with onfield incidents, and posts on Boards are not the way to do it.

If you need more clarification, please PM me.

Cots

TrueDub wrote: »

As I said to you by PM, there are ways of dealing with onfield incidents, and posts on Boards are not the way to do it.

If you need more clarification, please PM me.

Your intervention has killed what was an interesting discussion which I dont even think you remember at this stage, what do you think of how these teams faired last season? Do you have an opinion? Or did you just come onto this link to look for stuff to edit?

TrueDub

Cots banned for a week for ignoring mod instructions.

There is no problem discussing the topic at hand, but we cannot have a situation where clubs are being labelled as cheats.

Plates

TrueDub wrote: »

we cannot have a situation where clubs are being labelled as cheats.

Is it safer to list all the clubs that are not considered to be cheats?

Cots

TrueDub wrote: »

but we cannot have a situation where clubs are being labelled as cheats.

Plates wrote: »

Is it safer to list all the clubs that are not considered to be cheats?

Give me a minute while I write out every club in Leinster bar 3/4 including the one I mentioned prior to moderation and being banned

Cots

TrueDub wrote: »

As I said to you by PM, there are ways of dealing with onfield incidents, and posts on Boards are not the way to do it.

If you need more clarification, please PM me.

True Dub am I now allowed to ask your opinion on this subject having served my week?

TrueDub

You're allowed to ask, but I'm under no obligation to respond.

Cheating is a problem, but there's a solution: if more people got involved in umpiring, more games would get neutral umpires, which would remove the need to have players umpire themselves.

TheDrog

I can't see a situation in the near future where there will be enough umpires to cover all divisions so why not look at a sensible situation where only 1 umpire is provided for matches outside the top couple of divisions and teams provide the square leg umpire.

Renno

One of the many things I've learnt over the last couple of years is that virtually every club feels that they are perfect, and every other club are cheats. This applies to both umpiring and starring. Most clubs are both complained about and complain at some point - the problem is widespread.

And as has been pointed out, there is only one solution - non-playing umpires at matches.

How those umpires are allocated is open to question. It can not be disputed though that the vast majority of all new umpires (whether they are members of the LCU&SA or not) would have to come from the clubs.

Currently the umpiring rota is dominated by a small collection of clubs, with many clubs not having anyone regularly umpiring that comes from their ranks. This is one way that numbers could be increased dramatically.

There aren't that many ways either in which umpires can be allocated. We have the existing way, whereby the LCU&SA allocates it's umpires across matches.

We have the tried (and failed) way of teams picking a 12th person who travelled with the team and umpires. It should be noted that the only reason that this failed was because the clubs didn't want to do it, due to the problems of finding an extra person.

A third way could be for clubs to send umpires to a local match not involving their own club. That way all matches could have neutral umpires.

What isn't going to happen though is LCU&SA umpires being allocated on their own to lower matches. Umpiring has moved on a lot over the last five to ten years, and teamwork seems to have been the biggest change - even at club level.

Of the ten to fifteen thousand decisions an umpire has to make every match, well over half of them are made in conjunction with his/her partner. By removing that partner, a massive part of the umpire's aids/duties are removed.

Gordon Gecko

I don't think the situation whereby teams must umpire their own games at lower levels is ever going to change. There will always be cheating in that regard (catches and lbws not given) and certain teams (who everyone knows) will always be more blatant and unsporting in this regard than others. My main gripes are the placement of teams who are well above the standard of the divisions they are in. An instance where a club specifically requests to be placed in a division they know to be too low is outright cheating and it is the LCU's job to take action preferably by stripping them of the title and future sanctions. That said cricket at this level will never be perfect, it'd be great if there was some way to deal with cheats but until the LCU develops a better policy it's tough titty

Cots

TrueDub wrote: »

You're allowed to ask, but I'm under no obligation to respond.

Cheating is a problem, but there's a solution: if more people got involved in umpiring, more games would get neutral umpires, which would remove the need to have players umpire themselves.

Actually I was referring to your opinion on the topic in the second half of what was said here:

Gordon Gecko wrote: »

I don't think the situation whereby teams must umpire their own games at lower levels is ever going to change. There will always be cheating in that regard (catches and lbws not given) and certain teams (who everyone knows) will always be more blatant and unsporting in this regard than others. My main gripes are the placement of teams who are well above the standard of the divisions they are in. An instance where a club specifically requests to be placed in a division they know to be too low is outright cheating and it is the LCU's job to take action preferably by stripping them of the title and future sanctions. That said cricket at this level will never be perfect, it'd be great if there was some way to deal with cheats but until the LCU develops a better policy it's tough titty

The cheating thing was just me pointing out how the new teams are just as bad as some of the existing ones are.

djimi

Renno wrote: »

It should be noted that the only reason that this failed was because the clubs didn't want to do it, due to the problems of finding an extra person.

I dont think it failed because of clubs not wanting to do it; it failed because clubs werent able to do it. Maybe some of the bigger clubs can find three or four people a weekend to volunteer to umpire a game, but with the smaller clubs it can he hard enough to find 11 players, let alone a 12th who you are asking to come along and not play. It wasnt for lack of trying either; most captains I spoke to seemed to be in favour of the idea, but try as they might could not make it work (this was division 9).

Cots

djimi wrote: »

I dont think it failed because of clubs not wanting to do it; it failed because clubs werent able to do it. Maybe some of the bigger clubs can find three or four people a weekend to volunteer to umpire a game, but with the smaller clubs it can he hard enough to find 11 players, let alone a 12th who you are asking to come along and not play. It wasnt for lack of trying either; most captains I spoke to seemed to be in favour of the idea, but try as they might could not make it work (this was division 9).

This is quite true no club doesnt want to have people from their own club umpiring the whole game as they would believe that this will cut out the cheating that there is in the game so if they could I'm sure they would but personally I was glad that I didnt have to go looking for a 12th man to umpire every week (division 9)