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Welcome to the latest edition of GACO News.
Those present at the AGM in February wanted this quarterly missive to be continued and some even said they looked forward to opening it! So here we go!
Firstly, a very warm welcome to all the new GACO members. You’re all probably a bit confused by all the communications but GACO covers the whole county and BACUS and GACUS are charged with delivering the services you and the ACO require more locally.
With this newsletter, I take off my GACUS hat and write to everyone in Gloucestershire. I hope you enjoy your officiating in our county this summer.
CHAIRMAN’S MESSAGE
Hello everyone and another season is upon us. Firstly, a welcome to Michael Cowley onto the Committee as Secretary. His pencil is sharpened and he is ready to go! More about Michael elsewhere in this newsletter.
For those of us umpiring and scoring in WEPL this season, Duckworth Lewis will be in use in all divisions. Also, there are new disciplinary regulations in place. All will be explained at pre-season meetings.
Can I make a plea on behalf of all of the appointments officers who face a challenging season, finding it more and more difficult to cover all games? Please keep your availability up to date on whostheumpire.com.
Have an enjoyable season.
Howard
SCORER NEWS from Sue Drinkwater
Training
The training season is drawing to a close and it has been a busy for scorers this year with the following numbers trained.
Introduction to scoring – 11 at Thornbury CC and 21 at Kingsholm CC
Club Scorer – 7 at the Brightside County Ground, Bristol
Linear scoring – 17 at Hatherley & Reddings
DLS – 20 at Hatherley & Reddings
Thank you to John Lindley and Keith Horsley for the invaluable help in tutoring these courses and to the cricket clubs who hosted scorer training this winter.
Scoring software
The world of scoring is in turmoil at the moment due to an irresolvable dispute between CricHQ (who own the CricHQ scoring app and Total Cricket Scorer (TCS)) and the ECB (who own the Play-Cricket league management system and the newly released Play-Cricket Scorer app). This means that any software supported by CricHQ will no longer communicate with Play-Cricket and will cause scorers a lot more work, as those who use CricHQ or TCS will have to manually input their results into Play-Cricket and the Live Scores facility that outputs ball-by-ball match information will no longer automatically link to individual club ‘s Play-Cricket websites.
The new Play-Cricket Scorer app is aimed at clubs that don’t have a regular scorer rather than as a replacement for TCS and is not currently able to drive an electronic scoreboard.
Scoring appointments
We have once again been asked to provide scorers at a suitable level for Gloucs CCC 2nd XI matches and I am pleased to say that we have managed to appoint to all the home matches from our L3 and higher L2 GACO scorers, some of whom have also volunteered for away matches.
Andrew Marson is currently looking for scorers to cover Gloucestershire youth matches, so do offer him your availability and get involved this coming season.
Women’s World Cup (WWC)
In late June and early July England is hosting the ICC Women’s World Cup, with matches being played in Taunton, Bristol, Leicester and Derby. ICC has given ECB ACO permission to run stands in all venues to promote officiating and aid recruitment, with ECB ACO providing the materials for two stations at all WWC matches. Station 1 will be aimed at scorers, especially juniors and station 2 will be for general ECB ACO Information.
Thank you to all the GACO members who have volunteered to operate the stands at Bristol, where we have covered 7 out of the 8 matches being played there.
EDUCATION UPDATE from Bob Hampshire
Winter courses are now completed with the following attendances
Level 1- held at Bristol and Hatherley & Reddings. Total 21 attendees
Level 1A – held at Bristol. Total 14 attendees (12 GACO)
Level 2 – held at Bristol. Total 14 attendees (12 GACO)
Introductory courses were held at various locations in both North and South of the County – 250 attendees.
WEPL Regs changes
Not much to report here but these are the changes for 2017. They apply to all 3 tiers of WEPL
4.3 If Tea is not ready at the completion of the first innings then following a 10 minute innings changeover, the second innings will commence for a minimum of 15 overs or until the originally scheduled Tea break, whichever is the latter.
If there is a new ball amongst the spares then the use of this spare new ball is not permitted after the conclusion of the 5th over.
DLS is now to be used across all 3 tiers so more Run Rate calculations required.
Bonus points are now accrued from Ball 1 so a match does not have to go a minimum of 20 overs any more for extra bonus to be taken.
WEPL Player Discipline
As indicated in November 2016 WEPL accepted total responsibility for their shortcomings in how disciplinary matters were dealt with in 2016 following reports from Umpires. There has been a rewrite of these regs for 2017 and they are published in the WEPL handbook. They have been communicated and accepted by all clubs.In 2017 the league is determined to significantly improve behaviour. The process is now as follows.
- We must advise the player and his captain we will be reporting before we leave the ground
- We must advise WEPL by phone/email within 24 hours
- We must submit the formal report on WTU by Monday night
- The club has until Thursday to act
- If they appeal the hearing will be Thursday a week later
- If the appeal is lost the sentence is doubled!
We want to reduce the amount and volume of offensive language.
New requirement on us all!
Any player using language that is considered by either umpire to be foul or abusive, in frustration against themselves, at a match situation, or as an aside, that is heard by both umpires, will receive a first and final warning. Any repeat offence will immediately result in the player being reported for a breach of the Code at a minimum of Level 1. However, should the umpires consider the language used to be such that it can be heard by, and is offensive to, spectators, the player concerned will be immediately reported for a breach of the Code of Conduct without a warning.
For the full details please refer either to the WEPL handbook or to WTU were they are also published.
MEET OUR NEW SECRETARY – MIKE COWLEY
There has been a change in the GACO Committee’ which some of you may know already. Secretary, John Harper, stood down at the AGM and the reins have been taken over by Michael Cowley.
Mike has been a cricket player and fan for much of his life with most of his cricket played with various clubs in the Midlands where he has spent his working life.
moving to Gloucestershire in 2011 with international artist wife, Sandra, was in his words “a bit of a coming home” given that he follows the County Cricket here and his other hobby Swindon Town FC (hobby?).
He qualified as an umpire in 2007, but didn’t start umpiring until 2013. He retired from West Midlands police in 1997, but continued in full time employment with a Local Authority planning department in the Midlands, finally retiring in May 2011.
APPOINTMENTS
After the AGM a meeting was held to look at how the appointments in Gloucestershire might be managed this summer. We are delighted that Clive Jones has agreed to head the team and a breakdown of the responsibilities is attached as a PDF file.
As always it is worth reminding colleagues that our appointers work incredibly hard to get all the appointments made. It is much easier for them if you keep your availability on WTU up to date. If you are marked as available and then decline the appointment you are doubling their work load!
WEBSITE
Sue has recently updated the website so please keep in touch with it and send Sue any photos or snippets to be added.
MEMBERSHIP from John Lindley
First of all I hope that all new members who joined ECBACO following last winter's training have an enjoyable and successful season. Hopefully this will lead to you becoming more involved on a regular basis, whether it be as an umpire or a scorer.
On the general topic of membership - a reminder please to those who have not yet renewed their membership for 2017 to do so as soon as possible, particularly if you wish to be appointed to officiate in matches.
If you have not yet renewed your membership for 2017 you can do so by contacting ECBACO membership office at Edgbaston - they now take Card payments as well as Direct Debit or Cheque. However, a couple of things to bear in mind:
- ECBACO will only renew membership if your DBS is up-to-date and you have followed their process to get them to acknowledge your clearance!
- Similarly, please keep your contact details up-to-date with the ACO Membership Office. If your address or bank details change and you normally pay by Direct Debit, unless you let ECBACO know, then the system will not be able to process your renewal.
If you are no longer fully active as an official but would like to maintain contact with ECBACO with regard to umpiring or scoring activities then "Associate Membership" could be the answer. For Associate Membership you do not need a current DBS certificate and there is a reduced membership fee. However, you will still be kept informed of ACO issues although you will not have the opportunity to be appointed to officiate in matches.
Should you require assistance in contacting the Membership Office at Edgbaston, or if you would like help in resolving any membership queries please let us know and we will do what we can to assist.
Contact us at:
AND FINALLY…..
Lots of important messages have been included here, but I’d welcome far more mundane stories and photos from around the county in the hope that those who look forward to my email find it even more rewarding and those who can’t wait to hit the delete button take a bit longer to enjoy other’s tales.
If you have anything at all please don’t hesitate to send it so it can be shared.
If you are one of those people who John has referred to as not renewing their ACO membership, then this is likely to be your last GACO News. I’m sure you wouldn’t want that!
Peter Sawyer
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