“SIMMO” SIGNS OFF AFTER SUPERB REIGN

I suspect the developments of the past few days will have come as little surprise to many as Phil Simmons takes his leave of Irish cricket to start a new life as Head Coach of his native West Indies.

The Trinidadian deserved better than to end his sojourn having only just failed to lead his team into the knock-out stages of the World Cup and you sensed in the days before he announced his decision that he leaves with just a touch of unfinished business.

In many ways it would have been an easier call had he watched his team play, win or lose, in the knockout phase and it says so much about his reign that he clearly expected that that’s how it would end. The call of the Caribbean cannot wait however and Phil goes having taken Ireland to another new level in his eight years in charge.

He is absolutely the right man for his new job as he sets about changing the mind-set of a squad of players that to the naked eye seems more focused on getting into the IPL than playing International cricket. His legacy to Ireland is a set-up that is closer than it has ever been to breaking into the cricketing “big time” and moulding the squad with the belief, and more importantly the fight, to make up for their collective deficiencies.

Those close to Simmons insist he is as stubborn as a mule and one or two WC selections would certainly bear testimony to that; however in a result driven business, there is little argument that he held all the aces.

Phil will be sorely missed around the grounds for sure but he leaves behind a very exciting challenge for the next man in. Whilst his act, like Adi Birrell’s before him, will be tough to follow, the raw material and momentum is there for the right man.

After an enthralling World Cup campaign there will be little respite for the new coach and players as a busy summer looms. These are certainly exciting times for top level cricket in Ireland.

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The North West Union held its Biannual General Meeting at Eglinton on Wednesday night with much of the focus on the incoming Club Licensing Scheme. There were few surprises in Andrew Fleming’s presentation- as expected the first 12 months of implementation will centre on providing a solid infrastructure for youth cricket at each individual club.

The Chairman said that all clubs, from Qualifying up to Premiership will have a minimum set of requirements to fulfil by the end of 2016 but that the Union would continue to provide support towards accreditation. The St Johnston man also confirmed that the region hoped to have an additional CDO resource available from this year onwards. Brian Allen has done a vast amount of work in the past couple of seasons and as the demand for his services continues to rise, the North West is working with Cricket Ireland towards providing additional assistance.

The meeting heard that no official Fixtures Secretary has been appointed for the upcoming season. David Bradley has carried out the role up until now and he will continue to do so, supported by the Cricket Operations Committee. Any changes to that will be notified to clubs by the Union via the various media outlets.

One of the major issues to come out of the meeting is that given the critical umpire shortage this year, each club will have to nominate one person to attend a short umpire’s course, increasing the pool of people available to help out as the summer progresses.

David Bradley explained that as things stand the umpire situation is as bad as it has been at any time in the past decade and help is needed urgently just to cover even the senior fixtures.

Treasurer Peter McCartney also announced that the NWCU is currently evaluating the possibility of a text service to compliment the existing range of communication channels. The idea would be that subscribers would receive text updates from Premiership and Championship games at tea and again at the end of play every Saturday.

The service would also be used to send out prompts of upcoming representative fixtures and other news throughout the season. The initiative is dependent on securing sponsorship however- the Union forecasting that they would need to purchase a block of 20,000-30,000 messages in order to service demand.
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And finally for now it is impossible to draw a line under the past couple of months without mentioning the fantastic support of the Irish fans in Australia and New Zealand. As always, the boys and girls in green lit up the tournament and having struggled to sit up for six nights I have to confess I have no idea how Larry and his legion managed to travel a zillion miles in 4 weeks and never stop singing.

Jonny Heywood’s rendition of “Andy Scra” will also go into the Hall of Fame and it was clear from the messages from the squad on social media how much they appreciated that support. To be fair it was the same back home with Facebook and Twitter providing a fantastic back-drop to the action itself as supporters lived every moment from sofas all over the country.

For a month at least, people who wouldn’t know a cricket bat from a choc ice were engaging in conversations about bowling at the death. The trick, as always, will now be to keep even 1% of them interested during the coming summer. From a North West perspective I can confirm that the people driving the game here won’t fail on that front for lack of effort.