By Nick Creely
The Endeavour Hills Cricket Club is starved of success, having spent the last two seasons anchored to the bottom of the East/West ladder.
In arguably the strongest local competition going around – Victorian Sub-District Cricket Association – the Eagles have notched up just four 1st XI wins in two years.
But times are changing and the club is moving forward under the guidance of newly elected president, Jay Stent.
The 58-year-old club legend has a clear plan in getting the club – from its juniors to its seniors – back to being a powerhouse off and on field.
“It’s only been two or three weeks since I’ve been president, and the club over the last 12 months has put together a three-year plan that’s pretty detailed and covers a lot of areas,” he said.
“I’m linking all of that, we’re trying to create a really strong culture and to strengthen our links to the local community.
“We’ve got a very diverse community – we want to provide a level of cricket for a range of different skills and abilities – we want to strengthen that aspect of our club.”
On-field, the Eagles are graced by a number of talented youngsters, and Stent said that developing the kids is the main priority for the club.
“It’s about creating coaching structures that are targeted towards our younger cricketers.
“It can be challenging at times playing sub-district cricket because you can be travelling all the way out to Melton, Werribee and Hoppers Crossing, so that’s challenging building our quality of cricketers,” he said.
“We see the development of our younger cricketers at the moment – our focus is on our kids and bringing out kids through the system, and getting our kids into our top sides and if they’re good enough, then Premier Cricket with Dandenong, Casey or even Monash – that’s the ultimate aim.
“We would love to receive back from Premier Cricket too – players that maybe don’t want to play there anymore or are too old that want to play more locally.
“We’d welcome that and it’s a bridge we’re trying to build.”
Stent pointed out that the committee down at Sydney Pargeter Reserve is focused, sure of what it wants, and desperate to deliver a clear plan revolving around a more balanced coaching group.
“We’ve got a great committee and are clear about where we want to head, it’s just about putting the pieces together into place,” he said.
“One of our ambitions is to lessen the load of our head coach – with a club our size – the pressure on what is a part-time position is too much and we’re trying to develop a structure to lessen the pressure.
“We’re looking at a couple of our older players to come in and provide specific skills coaching for our kids and senior players, and just taking that pressure off the one person.”
The Eagles are expected to sit down with current captain/coach Brad Baptist when he returns from overseas shortly, and will likely announce some new signings in the coming months.
