ECB Recreational Cricket Safety Regulations

On Wednesday, you should have received notification from Wiltshire Cricket Ltd of the new ECB Recreational Cricket Safety Regulations. These include a number of changes, two of which are updates to content in the league rules. Specifically:
- The age at which players can play open age cricket has been adjusted, and is now based on their physical age, not their school year group.
- The number of overs a junior fast bowler can bowl in a spell has been changed to be based on the player's physical age, not their school year group. It has also been reduced in some cases. It is now:
Age 11 and below: 4 overs per spell, 8 overs per day.
Age 12 and 13: 5 overs per spell, 10 overs per day.
Age 14 and 15: 5 overs per spell, 12 overs per day.
Age 16 and 17: 6 overs per spell, 15 overs per day.
Age 18 and 19: 7 overs per spell, 18 overs per day.

These changes are ECB regulations and therefore must be followed, and supercede those in the league rules. These take effect immediately. I will be writing to captains and secretaries shortly to ensure they are aware of the above.

Umpire Qualifications

The qualification level for everybody who has attended an umpire's course or umpire's forum has now been updated. Also, the qualification level for those who attended an umpire's course in 2024 but have not attended two CPDs has been reduced.

Teams without a match on Saturday 10th May 2025.

Royal Wootton Bassett 3 (Division 6)

Teams without a match on Saturday 17th May 2025.

Keevil (Division 6)

Roll of Honour

Batting Roll of Honour - Weekend of 03 May
Morgan Smith 204 * Potterne 4 @ Box 2 Division 7
Matt Hunt 137 * Royal Wootton Bassett 3 @ Swindon Super Strikers 2 Division 6
Nick Crabbe 128 * Marlborough 2 v Coastal Cobras Division 4
Jonathan Anstee De Mas 122 Spye Park @ Swindon Hunters Division 5
Stan Alsop 118 Bishops Cannings v Erlestoke Division 2
Anre Schutte 107 * Warminster @ Chippenham 2 Division 1
Ben Da Costa 106 Corsham 4 @ Swindon Titans 2 Division 9
Kalvin Forrest 101 Swindon 5 v Winsley 4 Division 10
Christopher Allen 98 Swindon 2 @ Nationwide House Division 1
Darren Sutton 94 Bathford 2 v Chippenham 5 Division 9
Bowling Roll of Honour - Weekend of 03 May
Charlie Allen 9.0-2-23-7 Wilcot @ Heytesbury & Sutton Veny Division 5
Thomas Bates 7.0-0-17-6 Chippenham 3 @ Biddestone 2 Division 3
Bhavarth Chaudhary 8.3-4-13-5 Melksham @ Bradford-on-Avon Division 2
T Wilson 6.0-1-19-5 Burbage & Easton Royal 3 v Malmesbury 2 Division 7
Phil Woodcock 9.0-4-20-5 Wroughton Wranglers v Christian Malford Division 5
Ben Strange 9.0-2-36-5 Winsley 2 @ Allington Division 4
Cooper Webster 9.0-0-56-5 Erlestoke @ Bishops Cannings Division 2
Henry Pike 9.0-0-7-4 Combe Down @ White Horse Division 3
Seniru Fernando 9.0-4-12-4 Swindon 2 @ Nationwide House Division 1
Edward Read 9.0-5-13-4 Heytesbury & Sutton Veny v Wilcot Division 5

League Meetings

The 2025 Spring Meeting and AGM will both be held at Devizes Town Football Club. The Spring Meeting will be on Easter Monday, 21st April, and the AGM will be on Monday 24th November. Both will start at 19:45.

Umpire Qualifications 2025

ACO-Trained umpires. We previously said that to qualify as an ACO-Trained umpire, people who did the Introduction to Umpiring face-to-face course in 2024 would have to do all the CPDs in 2025. However, due to each CPD only being available once prior to the season starting, we have decided to reduce this. The requirement is therefore that to be an ACO-Trained umpire for 2025, you must have done the Introduction to Umpiring Course, and have attended at least two CPDs. Anybody who achieved the status of ACO-Trained umpire in 2023 or earlier, retains that status.

Forum-Trained umpires. Following the withdrawal of the online Stage One course, the league have decided to return to holding in-person Forum Training. This will take place in April. Venues and Dates will be announced in due course. Anybody who is already forum-trained will remain so.

Minor reorganisation, Divisions 7-10 after 2025 season

The league is growing quickly. We have had 29 new teams join the league in the last 5 years. 18 of those teams have been too strong to initially play in Division 10. The number of new teams coming into the league is well in excess of the number of gaps we can create to accommodate them at the correct level. Thus we now have a number of teams playing in too low a division. The number of teams in this position is such that normal promotion will not resolve the problem, plus we are likely to have more such teams apply to join the league in 2026.

Therefore, as stated at the AGM, there will be a minor reorganisation of Divisions 7-10 at the end of the 2025 season. Quite simply, we will take the teams who will play in Divisions 7-10 in 2026, and based on their 2025 results and the division they were playing in, we will put the strongest 10 teams into Division 7, the next 10 into Division 8, etc. This means it is likely that more than 2 teams will be relegated from each of these divisions. Obviously the decision as to which teams go into which division will be subjective, and won't be an easy decision for the committee to make. But our aim will be to get everybody playing teams who are at about their level.

Change of Teams and Fixtures, Division 4 and 5

Following a discussion at the AGM, Beehive Southwick have dropped from Division 4 to 5, and Avebury 2 have moved up from Division 5 to 4. This has caused the fixtures for these teams to change, and also for Coastal Cobras (Div 4) and Heytesbury & Sutton Veny (Div 5). All club secretaries and fixture secretaries have been informed, and the fixtures on this website have been updated.