Malmsbury and Kyneton cricket clubs will field both senior and junior teams in Gisborne and District Cricket Association this season.
As previously reported by Star Weekly, both clubs put in applications for their senior teams to join the competition this year.
Last Monday night, current senior teams voted unanimously in favour of the move from Castlemaine and District Cricket Association.
Malmsbury president Ed Kosmac said making the move to the GDCA made sense to provide a pathway from juniors through to seniors.
Both clubs already have junior teams in the GDCA.
“We had more than 90 per cent of members vote in favour of the move and now the clubs have supported it,” Kosmac said.
“Geographically, it has been hard having the teams in two different competitions.
“It was difficult when you’ve got parents driving their kids to games in the morning to then travel in a different direction to play themselves.
“We had no pathway and were in no-man’s land. This will give us more freedom to grow our club.”
Kosmac said Malmsbury is looking to field one junior and two senior teams next season.
He said the club wants to attract new players, and the fact it is the only club in the association to have a turf wicket should make it an attractive place to play.
“A lot of players love playing on turf, and they haven’t been able to in the GDCA,” Kosmac said.
“Turf wickets were one of the items at the general meeting, and they’re trying to encourage clubs to start looking at turf wickets. There are a couple of clubs interested, but having them in place is a while off.”
New GDCA president and former association secretary Rob McIntyre said the two clubs would bring the number of senior clubs to 20.
He said it was good to continue to grow the competition at the northern end of the region, with most of the recent growth in the south.
McIntyre said they would put options out about grading and what the structure may look like in the next week or so, before meeting to discuss these on August 15.
What grades both Malmsbury and Kyneton will be in is still to be decided, he said.
“We like our top teams in be in the top two grades, but we want to make sure our teams are competitive.
“Kyneton might be around C-grade and Malmsbury possibly in D-grade, but we still have to sort that out,” McIntyre said
