Kingswood Village CC (KVCC) is a traditional village club near Wotton under Edge, Gloucestershire which has experienced a recent renaissance.
The club reformed in 1978 but had only one men’s side until the KVCC Youth Cricket section was launched two years ago. The clubs “Youth Growth Prediction’ plans that by 2026 they will be running U9’s (Festival Team) and U11’s, 13’s, 15’s Girls and Boys, so 7 Youth Teams and with already impressive numbers it is heralded as a great club development blueprint by the Gloucestershire Cricket Foundation team.
In the first year KVCC Youth ran All Stars and Dynamos Cricket programmes but for 2023 season in addition they have run their first ever U11’s Mixed side and an U11’s Girls side in partnership with neighbouring Hawkesbury Cricket Club. There are now 60 youngsters at the club!
“Kingswood Village CC are a brilliant example of how a cricket club can build a youth section out of All Stars Cricket and their youth pathway continues to go from strength to strength. As the youth section grows, so does the demand for facilities and the Flicx 2G Pitch has proved a quality, versatile and cost-effective solution and is enabling the club to keep pace with their growing demands.” – Harry Watts, GCF Club Development Manager
It was the move to enter the Gloucestershire local Hardball Youth league cricket that prompted junior co-ordinator Neil Stacey to look at a 2G Flicx pitch. “We had bought a ‘pop up’ net that we wanted to use on our square but we also wanted to take pressure off the square, reduce wear and tear and ensure a truer safer bounce.” After a demonstration, a 10m Skills Batting End was purchased in June 2023.
This year KVCC have used their Flicx Pitch for hardball nets where the pitch is laid on a cut strip on the edge of the square and it’s also been used it in a couple of inter-club exhibition games as well as on top of one of their 7 turf wickets to give them more longevity (whilst utilising the flattest area of land which gives the Flicx pitch its best chance to ‘play’ true). Most recently it was rolled out at the village show where youth members played a pairs game with the villagers watching on! For the Village Show the pitch was laid the pitch in the middle of a football field as the cricket square itself couldn’t be used demonstrating the versatility of applications the Flicx wicket provides.
“We think the Flicx Pitch has been a huge success; it’s given us a great deal of flexibility, is very easy to put out and bring back in again and has played really well (good bounce and carry).”
Looking ahead to next year we were discussing using it for some of our home Youth league fixtures. We played on one away game on a Flicx Pitch at Golden Hill Cricket Club last year and it worked brilliantly. I would definitely recommend the Flicx Pitch to other clubs and we will again be utilising it on a weekly basis come next season.