IT’S a sign of the times that sporting clubs are looking to streamline their organisations and move into growth areas.
The former Marburg-Mt Crosby Cricket Club is a classic example.
With a declining player base in Marburg, club officials made an off-season decision to change the name.
It is now the Thunder Cricket Club.
While the renewed focus is on moving into the Fernvale growth area, recently appointed club president Luke Morgan said past Marburg traditions would be honoured.
“We’re not breaking away from Marburg,” Luke said.
“We still wear the green from Marburg.”
However, he confirmed ‘Marburg-Mt Crosby’ was dropped completely from the club name this season “to incorporate everyone”.
“It’s because we don’t play cricket at Marburg anymore,” he said.
“That’s not because we don’t want to. It’s just not possible anymore.”
The Marburg-Mt Crosby Club was formed in 2013 from two small clubs with similar cricket development goals and friendships.
The Marburg Mustangs were a first-grade team in the 1990s and early 2000s before dropping out of the Ipswich and West Moreton Cricket Association competition.
One of the cricketers from that successful Marburg era is former all-rounder Andrew Doyle, who continues to play an important role with the Thunder club.
Haigslea-based Andrew is the club’s Head of Coaching, working with the level 2C team and assisting other mentors developing junior talent.
Andrew is sad to see Marburg removed from the merged club’s name.
However, the West Moreton Anglican College HPE, Sport and Recreational Studies teacher and respected coach understands the new direction being taken.
“It’s a change in a little bit of history there,” Andrew said.
One of the main reasons was establishing a new base with extra facilities at Fernvale.
“So, our name probably didn’t match in terms of Marburg and Mt Crosby,” Andrew said.
“We’re training at Tivoli. We’ve got plans at Fernvale so that name didn’t incorporate where actually our bases are.”
Andrew said Thunder would remain a community club, mindful of past Marburg traditions.
“They are really important – remembering where we’ve come from and who some of those players were,” he said.
Andrew was part of Marburg’s first premiership success.
He scored 1970 first division runs and took 158 first grade wickets during two decades of playing from 1996-2017.
In the off-season, Luke replaced Troy Schroder who had a six-year stint as club president.
Luke was previously vice president, having a 10-year association with the club including nine seasons on the committee.
Other current Thunder Cricket Club executive members are vice president Adrian Ward, secretary Aliesha Munt, treasurer Eleesa Lewis, patron Brett Schmidt and senior registrar Chris Sefont.
“Change is good for any club and we’ve got a direction we want to head,” Luke said.
“We want to get back to being a really good family club that people want to come to enjoying playing cricket and hopefully bring the kids along.’’
In his first term as president, Third Grade offspinner Luke said junior development was a priority expanding from their Tivoli and Mt Crosby fields.
“There’s definitely a focus on the juniors to try and build this base,” he said.
“We want to increase these numbers and push out to encompass the Fernvale area as well.
“We’d like to see our numbers double in juniors in the next three or four years . . . and we can gradually build them into our senior teams.
“We’re in a very good position [with three venues] but we have to build those junior bases so we can get them to continue to play cricket for the next 10 years.”
That is especially important after the Thunder first-grade team withdrew from this season’s Cricket Ipswich competition.
“We just don’t have the numbers for three sides and the committee felt the better option was to play Second and Third Grade cricket and try to rebuild,” Luke said.
Andrew was among the coaches running junior training sessions in readiness for the new Cricket Ipswich season starting this weekend.
He enjoys working with cricketers of the future at Thunder.
“I’ll help with the set-up and help with some of the coaches,” Andrew said.
“I’ll have 2C. It’s a team I’ve had for the last two years so we’re slowly bringing them through.”
Andrew said he was encouraged by Thunder having teams in Level 1, Master Blasters, Level 2A and C, and Level 3 (merging with Laidley).
Players aged from five to 13 learn in the junior sides, before progressing into senior cricket.
The young players rotate through circuits to work on different aspects of their cricket development.
“It gives our coaches a chance to upskill as well so they can see different drills and skills,” Andrew said. “And it’s fun.”
