Tony Becca, Contributing Editor
THE PLEA by cricket clubs for financial assistance from the West Indies Board has stirred up quite a debate among a number of fans, and out of it has come a good question - why, after years of doing so, the clubs cannot now fund themselves?
The answer is simple: they just cannot afford to do so, and apart from the rising cost of almost everything, one reason is that over the years, and particularly so over the past 30 or 40 years, things have changed as far as the clubs are concerned.
Once upon a time, the clubs, formed as members' club, represented the social hub of the society, they catered for people with a passion for different sports - indoor and outdoor, the membership was huge, it represented the affluent of the society, and apart from paying dues and supporting the bar, they, along with their friends, supported fund-raising events organised by the clubs.
For those who do not remember, who were too young to know, or who were not yet even born, in those days, the clubs were the venues for such events as Boxing Day fairs and New Year's Eve balls.
DISASTROUS RESULTS
Today, however, that is not so. Today, the clubs, for a number of reasons, including the advent of service clubs and the growth of the lodge, no longer occupy pride of place in the social life of the society, and the result has been disastrous.
The result has been a gradual decline in membership - particularly by the middle class, a drop in revenue from the life-blood of the clubs - from dues and from bar sales and, on top of that, with so many other things to do and so many other places to go, people no longer support fund-raising events organised by the clubs regardless of how good or how attractive they may be.
Remembering that the clubs, in the good old days, catered to those who played football, tennis and billiards, is it because the clubs no longer play other sports?
That may well be so.
Apart from the fact that it was football, for example, that left the clubs and not the clubs that stopped playing football, and that cricket, unlike the old days, is now played all year, the truth, however, is that apart from an indoor sport like domino, the clubs, including Melbourne which also offers, along with domino, table tennis, badminton and darts, simply cannot afford to provide the facilities for sports like football and tennis.
The clubs, certainly Melbourne, Kensington and Lucas, simply do not have the money to offer anything else. In fact, the cost of playing cricket is such that they can hardly afford it if indeed they can really do so.
Traditionally, youngsters, schoolboys, do not pay dues, and in the good old days, there were few youngsters, apart from members' sons, in the clubs. In those days, all the members, but for the few, paid dues and supported the bar as well as fund-raising activities.
Today, however, the clubs, the cricket clubs, and that includes Kingston CC, are packed with youngsters, and that means less revenue less money to provide facilities, to prepare the ground and the pitch, to provide equipment and gear, and to pay for lunch and tea.
The truth about the clubs is this: while they were formed as members' clubs, while they operated for a long time as members' clubs, based on what is now happening, based on the membership and the fact that the few who pay dues no longer play the game or never did play the game, that those who play do not pay, the clubs are no longer members' clubs - certainly not when compared to golf clubs and to tennis clubs where the members, regardless of their age and their level of skill, play the game.
In this day and age of sponsorship, the clubs are unable to attract sponsors, and in this day and age of government funding, the clubs hardly receive any sponsorship and get no funding and it is not because they have not tried to do so.
Although the clubs, the members clubs, have produced the vast majority and the best of Jamaica and West Indies representatives, the answer, 99 per cent of the time, is this: why should we sponsor or fund a private members' club?
PLEADING WITH THE BOARD
That is why the clubs have to plead with the board with the body that receives money from sponsors, from tours, from gate receipts and from television rights because of the players and the quality players produced by the clubs.
There are three reasons, however, why the clubs should also get some help from other sources.
The first one is that without them there would be no Jamaica or West Indies team; the second reason is that over the years they have produced the vast majority and the best of Jamaica and West Indies representatives; and whether they want to accept it or not, the third reason is because, in reality, the clubs are no longer members' clubs - certainly not private members' clubs.
These clubs, all named cricket clubs when they were formed over 100 years ago, are now cricket clubs and open to all who can play the game and who want to learn to play the game regardless of class, creed or colour.
