Sheffield Cricket Lovers' Society Year Book 2026

With so much talk about encouraging children into cricket by showering them with short- form ‘TikTok cricket’, it is gratifying to see just what an impact a whole day at friendly cricket can have on a varied age group of young people. I lost count of the number of inter-generational off-field games that went on beyond the boundary, all this with neither mobile phone nor tablet in sight. The importance of this cannot be overstated. Children are as absorbent as sponges, and they retain what they imbibe naturally and unconsciously. I believe this based on the hours of my own childhood – and of my son’s young years – spent in cricket-field-boundary games. Perhaps what makes our tour more unusual than others is not only the fact that the players’ partners have always been part of it, but also that there is a mix of generations as well. On this tour, we had two girls under the age of ten, who had come over from Germany with their dad, who himself was just nine when he first toured with us. His younger brother, who was four on his first tour, was also with us this year, his baby son contentedly observing all around him while nestling in his father’s arms. But that was not all. With them was the baby’s grandfather, still playing as part of the team, and his grandmother, relishing the rare pleasure of having all her family around her for a few glorious days. It fascinated me that as early as the second day, these little girls had become obsessed with playing inter- generational family cricket – grandfather behind the stumps, father or uncle bowling, sister catching. This ‘obsession’ is not ageist. It was matched by my half-blind dad, (our very own Wilfred Rhodes) who sat on the boundary watching his two sons and his grandson play in front of him, cider in hand, as those around him described the action. Most of the time, both his sons, his daughter or his grandson were doing the scoring at the table beside him, chuckling at his witticisms as he agonised over poor performances. These shared experiences are bonding moments preserved as family folklore for a lifetime. But perhaps for me the biggest success for cricket on this tour was the initiation into 27