November 2016 - Operation 'Chippenham' Child

Last season, Chippenham CC made great strides on and off the field. Performances on the field were positive and this was in no small part as a result of the atmosphere within the club that had stemmed from a ‘Club Values’ document that players agreed on prior to the season, amongst other things.

One of the agreed values was that of inclusiveness and making those around you, whether in the 1st XI or 4th XI, feel part of the club. With this in mind, the club wanted to extend this goal of ‘supporting others’ slightly and extend the Chippenham hand out to a wider world, whilst continuing to get the clubs members to work together and contribute, in their own ways, to achieve a goal (similar to a Saturday where 11 players execute various skills in various ways with an aim of enjoying & winning the game).

Cricket clubs, and other organisations, spend a lot of time raising money for themselves, whether it be for a new piece of equipment, a renovation or to simply subsidise the costs of playing cricket, and although there is nothing wrong with this in the slightest, it occurred to me that it might be a nice idea once in a while to do something for someone else…

Owen Alsop, who led on this project for Chippenham CC, remembers packing and decorating shoe boxes at primary school for Operation Christmas Child, and, with the festive season upon us, he thought it would be a fun exercise for the club to have a crack at, anyone from any age and any team could have a go.

Owen explains; ''In some cases players worked together to provide a box, in others the competition to provide the best decorated took prevalence!

Ultimately, we received in excess of 15 boxes, with a few choosing to deliver theirs individually, so it’s likely that we broke the 20 barrier. Not bad for a first attempt, and it was a late decision which may have cost us a couple more contributors, but we have a target to beat next year now and something is better than nothing, especially in the cases of the children these boxes will be reaching next month.

It was heartening to see such a positive response from the club, and it was a worthwhile exercise on two fronts:

1) We contributed to a worthy cause &

2) We worked together to do this, further bringing people together from all areas of the club.

I think there is certainly a place for local cricket clubs to do more in the way of community/charity projects and we will certainly be doing another one in the future''.

Well done to Owen and Chippenham CC on this excellent initiative