The Gundagai District Cricket AGM was held at the Lotts Hotel on August 13, which saw executive positions filled in preparation for the 2025-26 season.
The new committee includes some new and old faces in a season that will be ready come the summertime. These positions were named as follows: Senior President – Mick Hargreaves, Junior President – Tim Ryan, Vice President – Clayton Smith, Secretary – Charlie Braun, Treasurer – Craig Ferguson.
Both Gundagai and Mankadders have nominated sides in the Elders and Hogan Cups. Craig Ferguson spoke to the Gundagai Times about the AGM and what cricketers (or potential ones) can look forward to.
“The AGM was well supported. We had a good representation there of both seniors, juniors and players as well. We managed to fill all the positions, which is always good. We’ve got a couple of new faces and a couple of remaining faces, which is nice to have that mix of old and new,” he said.
“Financially, we had a good season with the cricket club, and we’re pretty excited about the new nets being built over the off-season, so they will be ready for the start of this year’s cricket season. They will be in operation, ready to go.
“We’ve got some new young faces, like Clayton Smith, who’s been a junior cricketer for many years and has made the transition into the senior ranks. He’s now stepped up into the Vice President’s role, which was really good of him to put his hand up to do that. “Another young cricketer who’s played a lot of his juniors together with Clayton is Charlie Braun.
“Michael Hargreaves is our remaining President. He’s with the Murrumbidgee Mankadders. It’s nice that we’ve got a voice from outside of Gundagai as well as a voice inside of Gundagai, and I’m remaining as treasurer. We had Pete Reardon, who’d been our junior president for many years, and did a great job in that role, has been taken over by Tim Ryan, who’s got a foot in both camps as he’s got kids in the juniors, but also plays a bit of senior cricket himself.
“Caleb Lindley-Kell, who’s our current Elders Cup Hogan Cup captain, was there representing the players as well. It was good to have his voice. “We are always looking for cricketers, so if there’s anybody who is looking for a game of cricket, contact the Gundagai District Cricket Association. “Tim Ryan has actually been the senior President previously. He’s had a pretty long association with cricket in Gundagai. He’s always been involved in junior cricket, but not necessarily as the President, but he’s happy to take on that role for us moving forward. He’s got some great ideas and great initiatives, and he is good with the computers, and he’ll have a great season.
“The Under 16s are going to play in the Southwest competition that they made the Grand Final in last cricket season, and we are also going to be entering an Under 13s into that Southwest competition as well. That’s exciting that there’s an extra team that we’ve created.
“The sub-juniors will be operating as normal on a Saturday morning between Tumut, Adelong and ourselves, and we’ll be having our master blasters for those eight and under. “I’ve done the role for a long time now, but I’m happy to still be involved in cricket.
“Clayton had been a junior cricketer. He’s a 21-year-old young man now. We are really excited to have him and Charlie join the executive team because they’re obviously the youth and the future of the competition and the organisation, so it will be great to have their voice represented in decisions moving forward.
“We would like to encourage junior and senior cricketers to think about playing cricket for the upcoming season. We’re always looking for new people to play cricket, either as a senior on a Saturday afternoon in the Elders Cup competition, or if there are any primary school or high school age kids that want to play, we will be promoting cricket fairly soon. We’re just getting the footy season and the winter sports out of the way. Once the winter sports are done, we’ll be ramping up.
“Play HQ is the portal to go to if you’re a parent or you’re interested in playing cricket. If you search for a Play HQ space, you should be able to find information about the upcoming cricket season on Facebook or, obviously, through the Gundagai Times local paper.
“We are excited about having new nets for the upcoming cricket season, and that came about because of the work between Cootamundra Gundagai Regional Council and the Cricket Club. It’s not done through any grants or anything.
“We’ve raised the money ourselves as a council and as a sporting organisation, so that’s really good that we can do that. We’ve got great facilities in town with the turf wicket and with the synthetic at Owen Vincent Oval, so we’ve got some good facilities in Gundagai, and the nets are going to really add to that as well.”
If you’re interested, Craig would be happy to have a chat on 0412 913 974.
– Jack Murray
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