HCCC Newsletter - October 24

Hi Members,

Unfortunately, after Monday's announcement, we are another 2 weeks away at least from being able to get together and start the cricket season. We are looking forward to today's announcement where the government have said they will provide more detail on the vaccination targets required to move us out of lockdown. This will hopefully provide a bit of a timeline to getting cricket underway too.
On Tuesday morning ACA held its Club Managers meeting and announced that they are now working towards a season start date of Saturday 13th November. 

This weekend we will be looking at the junior registrations and formulating teams. If you have children who want to be in the same team as someone else please ensure this is in the notes area of your registration. We will do our best to accommodate all requests however we can only work with the registrations we have at the time. If you know of anyone who has not registered please encourage them to do so. The hope is that as soon as gathering sizes of 25 are allowed we will begin training and when gatherings of 50 are allowed we will be able to play.

Details in FriendlyManager (registration system)
Please login and check that all your details are correct - email addresses, phone numbers, address, and for U18's - school and school year. 

Uniform Shop
Thanks to those of you who purchased uniform. We will be in touch in the next week or so to arrange pickup of your purchases. The uniform shop has closed again for now, but we will be re-opening in a couple of weeks for further purchasing. 

Cricket Training
Cricket Training is again on hold until we move to a level where we can safely deliver trainings within the government guidelines. 

Why not do some training at home...
Here's a video of Will O'Donnell showing us how to do the batting drill we sent you last week https://www.facebook.com/aucklandcricket/videos/621029602220791/

This week we have the following drills for you to try:
Batting: Hold the ball between your chin and front shoulder. Drop the ball and step forward and hit so you practice your front foot drive.
Fielding: Stand a couple of meters away from a wall and get someone to stand behind you and underarm the ball from different angles to practice your reflex catching.Hit tennis ball high into the air on a windy day to help catching on the run. 
Bowling: Place a target down on the ground and practice trying to land the ball on it. Try 3 steps out from the batting crease and in line with off stump. Remember to practice bowling to left hand players too. 

Register and Win
We are a little late getting this weeks newsletter out so we have the winner of the third week and also the final week to announce today. As with previous weeks the prize is a Cricket Express voucher to the value of $25.00 Thanks to Cricket Express for your support

Week 3's winner was Tyler Potaka. Congratulations Tyler.
This weeks winner was Neal Palande. Congratulations Neal.

Season Start DatesPlease note the new start dates:

• Junior and Senior Hardball grades start play on the weekend of Saturday 13th November
• Youth Midweek Social Cricket - Wednesday 17th November
• Superstar skills and games - Friday 12th November
• Club Summer Series U13 and U15 - Sunday 5th December
• Club Summer Series U15 and U17 T20 tournaments - 18-20 January save date 21 Jan

What's allowed and what's not - Sport NZ and ACA guidelines

• Public outdoor nets and artificial pitches are open but only for activities that meet the government protocols (no competition play) and all indoor venues must remain closed.
• Do not share equipment, and no gatherings of over 10 people.
• You can partake in a live net situation if you are with people from your bubble or household whilst maintaining a 2 metre distance from those not in your bubble/household.
• You can partake in an organised fitness session (i.e., yoga, running, bootcamp – not cricket activity) of up to 10 people (including the trainer) from different households as long as you keep 2 metres and do not share equipment.
• The only time that you can partake in a net situation (i.e., throwdowns or batting training) with people from outside your household is when it is in a one-on-one capacity with a professional coach and the batter hits the ball back to the coach with their bat (and maintains a 2 metre distance and does not share any equipment). 
• Bowlers can bowl in a net situation with others from outside their household but must maintain a 2 metres distance from anyone else, not share a ball (or any other equipment) and there must not be a batter (unless they are from the same bubble as the bowler).
• A coach can run a cricket session with more than one player as long as all players are from the same household, the coach does not share any equipment with the players and keeps a 2 metre distance at all times.
• We were requested to clarify if cricket specific trainings falls under ‘outdoor fitness group’ at this stage it is our understanding and advice that team cricket trainings (i.e. nets or open wicket situations) are not permissible under the current Stage (regardless of if the coach is a professional or not).

Sponsors Corner
This week, we continue to introduce you to our sponsors. Please support them as much as you can, and if you would like to sponsor the club to any degree please get in touch, we would love you to join our team.

Kookaburra
We are very excited to introduce Jason Mills and his team at Kookaburra to you, our members. This year Kookaburra have stepped in and offered further sponsorship to HCCC allowing us to offer our Superstar Program (for our youngest members) free for term 4 2021. Kookaburra was founded in 1890 and are still a family owned business with offices in Australia, New Zealand, India and the UK as well as an agency in South Africa. They are a truly global brand supplying cricket and hockey equipment for all levels and all ages, as well as footwear and clothing. Kookaburra also assist with our youth academy and our coaching and we have all seen the amount of runs and wickets Ramesh Lakmal is achieving welding his Kookaburra Bat and swinging that Kookaburra ball.We encourage all members to look at Kookaburra for all their cricketing needs. Thanks Jason and the Kookaburra team. 

Cricket Express
Thank you to Cricket Express for their continued support of our club. They are now into year 6 of sponsoring the club and assisting us in our growth, from coaching packs to gift vouchers and especially around our prizegiving's. We love having Cricket Express as part of the team. Based in Albany the friendly, knowledgeable staff are there to assist, and their online store is up and running with new stock arriving weekly. Register with Cricket Express and you will have access to a further discount when you shop in store or online.

Meet the People
This week we are introducing some of our Managing Committee

Jeff Olufson - Treasurer
Originally from Australia, which is where my love of cricket originated, I have actually spent most of my life living in Auckland. Most recently here on the Coast since 2007.

I never really amounted to much as a player making a duck and dropping a catch in my only ever rep trial in Under 15's but have always enjoyed playing and watching cricket. When my son, Sam, was young I spent many hours watching, scoring and umpiring. After first getting involved with the club in 2007 when Sam started playing here, I traipsed across Auckland each Saturday often transporting a car full of what seemed like half the team as well as the gear bag to and from games.

Then I expressed an opinion to a committee member...The next thing I knew I was attending meetings and being elected as Treasurer. That was back in 2009. Since then I have enjoyed being part of the club's development as we have grown our playing numbers and capability on and off the field. I am pleased with the progress the club has made and see an exciting future for us as an emerging force in Auckland's cricketing landscape.

Putting the current Covid handbrake aside, we have an exciting season ahead of us as we achieve a long term goal and our Senior Men make a comeback to the ranks of the Premier competition after many years.

When we can, we hope to bring some exciting matches to Victor Eaves park this season - welcoming some of the best Auckland Cricket has to offer to our own back yard.

Through the club I have also enjoyed the opportunity for a second playing career in our Presidents grade team. My appearances have become more infrequent over recent seasons but I have enjoyed playing cricket again - in fact I've probably made more runs and taken more wickets than in my younger days.

We are the envy of many who visit the Coast to play us when they see the cricketing environment we enjoy here. I'd encourage everyone to get involved in what ever way you can with helping the club grow and improve.

Amanda Cotterell - Junior Chair
Amanda has been involved with HCCC since 2012 when her eldest son, Kade, started playing Superstar Cricket (or Milo cricket as it was then know). Approx 6 years ago she joined the committee and has done the majority of admin around juniors since, along with managing teams and scoring games. As well as volunteering for HCCC and sitting on the Managing Committee she also chair's a school board and works while raising her 4 kids. Her youngest, Denin, is in his 3rd year of cricket now and we'd like to think Amanda will be involved with the club for many more years. Her girls are not so keen on cricket but they can occasionally be found on the side of the cricket pitch supporting their brothers. Big thanks to Kade for helping out over the past few years at Superstar cricket and also the rest of the family for understanding the hours of work put in, especially at the start and end of the season.

Jason Mills - Committee Member
Jason was born in Castor Bay, Auckland and has one younger brother
His favourite food is Italian and he loves to holiday in Fiji
Other than cricket, Jason enjoys tennis and football
The most famous people he has ever met are Bjorn Borg and Richard Branson
Jason's highest batting score is 164 not out and his best bowling figures are 5-30
Jason has played for the Auckland Aces and NZ “A” against England.Fastest bowler he has faced and wicket kept to? Andrew Caddick from England and kept to Alan Donald (known as white lightening) in England.
Jason's father was the co-founder of Hibiscus Coast Cricket Club and Chairman of the football club and grew up playing for both entities. He was the NZC National wicket keeping coach for 15 years.
Jason is currently manager of Kookaburra Sport which he loves doing and it also allows him to give back to the club he first started with.

So what are you waiting for?

Register now for some cricket fun in the sun with your mates.
www.hibiscuscricket.co.nz/register

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Our next newsletter will be sent out during the week beginning Monday 1st November.