Girls Cricket Pathways

We are excited to share that the Lindfield Cricket Club committee has been unanimous in deciding to develop girl specific programs, deliver specialist female coaching, and pathways defined for Lindfield girls. This mirrors Cricket Australia’s goals to increase female participation sustainably and accelerating opportunities for women and girls in all areas and levels of the game. They have seen amazing growth in girls’ participation over the last four years with over 5000 all girls teams playing cricket throughout Australia.

Cricket Australia girl promotional videos can be viewed here: https://www.cricketaustralia.com.au/about/diversity-and-inclusion/female-participation

Club Competition

Lindfield Cricket Club is committed to providing support for girls who choose to play with the following development stages:

U7 (5–6 year olds) Lindfield Skills Clinic
U8 Woolworths Cricket Blast
Competitive cricket from U9s through to U17s
- In the girls only Sixers competition against girls from Mosman through to Pymble, or.
- Standard mixed competition with some or no boys in the team

For more detailed information on the Cricket options for Lindfield Girls, go here.

Lindfield Cricket to act on its commitment in 2021/22 introduced a club cap with pink. Then in 2022/23 we went all the way and introduced girls specific training tops, shorts, playing tops, and shorts.

Representative Cricket U13 & 15s

Once we have an eager female cricketer within the club, it is vital that for girls who wish to play more cricket that the junior pathways are known. Lindfield District Cricket Club (LDCC) is part of the North Shore Junior Cricket Association (NSJCA) who enter representative sides from all 8 of the association’s clubs in the below competitions against other district representative clubs:

U13 (Mollie Dive Shield) and
U15s (Margaret Peden Shield)

Brewers Competition U17s

After U15s NSJCA representation, the next step is in the U17s Brewers Shield competition that is expected to start on 9th October. With a minimum age of 14, the Brewers Shield is where a Grade Club like Gordon trains and manages a team to play on turf in a similar format to the boys U16 Green Shield with the same level of prestige. In the past, a few Lindfield girls have participated in the Brewers competition.

This year the Peden U15 Representative competition is taking the same approach to as the boys green shield with the tournament being played around the Christmas and New Year period that means it no longer conflicts with Brewer shield and the stronger 14-year-old girls may have an opportunity to participate in both Brewers and Peden competitions, or at least fill in for the Brewers competition if the team is short on players around Christmas and New Year.

Academy

In addition to training and playing for Lindfield, Gordon U15 runs a girls development program from mid-October to the end of November (6 weeks). This program has been run over the past 5-6 years that helps girls make the transition to playing on turf. Additionally, it prepares Girls for the Orange U15 carnival in January.

Gordon head coach Charlotte Anneveld has played for the ACT Meteors and Sydney Thunder in WBBL|01.

For more information in joining the U15 academy and playing for Brewers in 2023/24 season, please contact Beny Chun the President of Gordon Women's Cricket.

Conclusion

We are excited at the prospect of growing Lindfield Girls Cricket, we have the support of the club committee and have identified pathways and a partnership with Gordon to be a feeder club into their senior program and in return, Gordon will supplement our female coaching team. We realise this is a long-term plan and need to find ways for this upcoming season to double the number of girls playing cricket for Lindfield which currently sits at 40, for this to succeed we need everyone’s support and encouragement for girls to play cricket. If you feel that our communication is missing the mark, or you are not getting the support you need, then we need to hear from you.

The Full Pathway

All the way to the top!