Platt bemoans lack of finance and playing staff

Sep 5 2008 Liverpool Daily Post

THERE can be few greater contrasts on the penultimate Saturday of the Business Assistance Liverpool Competition season than that between Rainford and Huyton.

While Dave Tully’s players are preparing to visit Newton-le-Willows knowing that a victory would make them one of the favourites to be promoted to the Premier League, Dave Platt isn’t even sure if he will have enough players to fulfil the club’s fixtures.

“We’re limping home,” said Huyton’s chairman and first team captain. “We’re very thin on the ground regarding basic availability, never mind strength. I’ve been very disappointed with the level of commitment from some players.”

Platt’s team is bottom of the First Division and have been certainties to be relegated since mid-August. In the longer term, the very future of the club is in doubt.

“Our two major problems are finance and playing strength,” said Platt. “As regards the first, we’ve had an offer of help from an ex-member and we’re exploring other avenues in the hope of keeping us afloat through the winter. Player availability is a great unknown until the start of next season. If it’s anything like it has been in the last three weeks, then we’re in trouble.

“We’re looking for the membership to back us up by playing, volunteering and doing ground work,” he concluded. “There’s just six or seven people doing everything.”

No one should be in any doubt that the continued existence of one of the Liverpool Competition’s founder members is under threat. A crisis doesn’t come much bigger for a cricket club. The mood is very different at the Jubilee Recreation Ground where Rainford’s players have hugely enjoyed their first season in Competition. Yet to some extent, each club owes its position to the introduction of promotion and relegation and the increased fluidity in the recreational game on Merseyside.

“We’re going to have our strongest possible side out for the Newton-le-Willows match,” said chairman John Williams. “Of course it’s a big game, but promotion will be a bonus for us. It’s not been a big surprise that we’ve done well though. The current group of young players is as good as any in the league except Ormskirk.”

As for the future, the only thing Williams shares with Platt is a love of cricket and a commitment to a particular club. “There are still one or two of our players who haven’t done as well as they can,” Williams disclosed. “But the team has had a taste of success and it wants more. We’ve a lot to look forward to.”

Dave Platt, one imagines, would be happy if he could be assured that cricket would still be being played at Huyton Lane in two years’ time.