Home win for South Liverpool as cricket returns to Wirral village after eight years

Players and officials of South Liverpool and Caldy on the pitch at Torr Park, Eastham, ahead of their game on Sunday, May 11

A 172-year-old village cricket ground without a club, a fast-growing club without a home… it’s a match made in heaven for Eastham and South Liverpool CC.

A journey which began with a scroll on Google Earth had its first major milestone on Saturday, when South Liverpool’s 2nd XI took on Caldy’s 3rd XI at Toor Park.

It was the first competitive match in the Wirral village for eight years – the club’s cricket development officer, Azam Udayar, hopes it’s the start of something special.

Since forming in 2018, South Liverpool have made waves in the Love Lane Liverpool Competition’s 3rd XI leagues, winning their Sunday league at the first attempt before switching to Saturday cricket.

They earned promotion to the 3rd XI Premier Division in 2022 and have finished second and third since then. 

The club has expanded to three open sides and two women’s.

But as a nomadic club – currently renting space at Northern’s Moor Park – they are limited in how far they can go.

So Udayar was tasked with finding a home. Last February, he was speaking to Wirral council’s Ally Noonan about the Bebington Oval, when something caught his eye.

He says: “She was telling me the bottom pitch at Port Sunlight might be available, so I was on Google Earth looking at that, and I just saw what looked like a square in Toor Park.

“I pushed the time back to 2012 and the square was there, then pushed forward to now and it disappeared. 

“I asked what it was, and Ally said it was no longer in use. So I just said can we have it? She said obviously it will take a lot of work.

“Straight away I spoke to Jason Gooding, who is the director of neighbourhood services for Wirral, and he was so helpful – he just said go for it.

“I went down to take a look and it didn’t look like a cricket pitch, it was knee-high with grass. 

“Nobody had done anything with it because they were using it as a dog park.”

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The pitch used to be home to Eastham CC, which folded in 2017.

But Udayar saw past the grass – and whatever the dogs had left – and saw potential.

He and the club set to work on the ground, and on renovating the old clubhouse.

This year, groundsman Stuart McCall, who already works with Birkenhead Park, Maritime and Oxton on the Wirral, came on board to finish off the square.

And last week – just 15 months after Udayar’s first enquiry – cricket returned to Eastham.

A T20 friendly was held to make sure the pitch played well, before the historic visit of Caldy.

South Liverpool made 237/6 in 41 overs, with half-centuries for Abhishek Appankunju and Akhila Mohanan, setting up a 135-run win.

But the real victory was being there at all.

“It was playing really well, better than I thought,” said Udayar.

“It kept low a few times but that’s expected, it’s the first game in eight years.”

The Comp’s structure is changing next year with the absorption of the Southport & District Amateur Cricket League. 

Clubs like South Liverpool, Liverpool Superkings and Merseyside Sports & Cultural Club, who currently play in the Comp’s 3rd XI structure, are set to join the SADACL clubs in a new division of the Comp.

This integration will open up opportunities for the nomadic clubs, but also present challenges, and Udayar is keen not to rush in. South Liverpool’s 1st XI will remain at Northern for the time being.

“We are moving gradually,” Udayar said.

“The change that’s coming in will affect the 1st XI, because we might need to make a bit of a step up. 

“We are competitive and our players are very capable. Having the pitch in play now puts us in a good position for the future. 

“Once we’re confident that it’s going to play to a good enough standard, then we will bring the other teams in – whether that’s next season or the season after, or whenever. 

“We are being very careful so the interest in cricket is not lost because of the playing facilities.

“We’re playing only one team there to start with. We don’t want to overload the pitch, so we thought we’d do a gradual transition. 

“But eventually we’ll be able to move the other teams there.”

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Even that will not be the end of the journey.

In common with other nomadic sides in Merseyside, most of South Liverpool’s 76 members are from the South Asian background community. 

The club does not currently have a junior section. But as it grows, and gets the rare opportunity to put down roots, Udayar’s vision is of becoming part of the furniture in Eastham.

He says: “We want junior cricket, so the idea is to fill a junior section with children local to Eastham. 

“And we’re going to try to recruit coaches locally. That will form a pathway for players to come through.”

Udayar is keen to thank the league for their support, along with Ally Noonan, Jason Gooding, Matthew Humble, Darran Marquis, Carl Davies and Mike Penny from Wirral council, Lancashire Cricket Foundation’s Paul Morris, and David Allen and Stephen Bailey from the Eastham Village Preservation Association.

The EVPA welcomed the club in its latest newsletter, delighted that the field was now a “field with a purpose”.

Udayar adds: “The locals are loving it – some of them are quite emotional to have cricket back there. 

“And what they’ve said in their newsletter was very moving for us.”

from Merseyside Cricket Online https://ift.tt/iqfMyjG