We hope everyone is having a happy holiday season and looking forward to 2005. The first match of the season is in only 14 weeks time (09 April 2005) against Crossbats. Each season seems to come sooner and sooner. The Crossbats games is definitely a 2 sweater (or fleece) job. We must be crazy to play so early on in the season!

Much preparation has already been done for the forthcoming season. With the 2005 Fixtures now complete attention is now being focussed on the following themes.

Equipment update
Part of the clubs funds goes towards buying new equipment that players use during the season such as bats, pads, gloves, ball etc. Where appropriate we are getting bats serviced (sanded, oiled, scuff guard put on an face of bat, re-gripped) to pro-long their life. A number of bats come pre-prepared (the bats which don't requiring oiling every season). These bats are just being re-gripped. The work is being carried out by Fordham Sports. The Sunday Captain has provided us with a kit audit for the Sunday Kit bag. We are still awaiting the Saturday audit. Any excess kit is being removed from bags and put into storage. Where kit is not deemed to be in a state which can be repaired it will be disposed off. In the past some of the old kit has been donated to schools. Any new kit distributed also is marked with MCCC initials.

In the past, kit loss during the season has been bit of an issue. The club spends a lot of money on investing in equipment for its members. Some members have kindly made kit donations to the clubs to supplement this. The club is grateful to those who have done this.

New Member Initiatives in 2005
For the forthcoming season we need to try and attract another 5 members paid up members. With each season we do have natural wastage of members for various reasons, the majority down to family commitments and moving out of the area.

Although the membership secretary is tasked with managing membership drive for 2005 we all need to work as a collective to help recruit more people. I will be asking people to put up a few posters in local areas to promote interest in the club. Some of the places we have targetted in the past include

Local Libraries
Super market community boards
Places of worship (Churches, Mosques etc etc.)
Community Centres
Local Papers
Websites (check out play-cricket.co.uk)

YOUR CLUB
This is your cricket club. If you have any new ideas for the club or you're not completely happy with an aspect of the club's running please don't leave it to the AGM to raise the issue. Speak to the chairman (chairman@mordencorinthians.org.uk) and let's see what we can do.