The Membership consultation period has now closed. Thank you for your feedback.
Derbyshire County Cricket Club Membership
I hope you and your family are keeping safe and well. These are unprecedented and extremely challenging times for all and I would like to extend my best wishes, and those of the Supervisory Board, to all of our Members.
Following my correspondence to you earlier in June regarding the club’s ongoing governance review, I wanted to provide you with the latest update regarding the season and Membership.
At the time of writing, domestic cricket is set to return from 1 August, and the ECB in consultation with all 18 first-class counties and the PCA, are closely following government guidelines and working on a programme of fixtures.
It is hoped that we can host both red and white ball matches in 2020 and if government guidelines allow we would of course be delighted to welcome spectators to The Incora County Ground, with Members the club’s priority.
The safety of players, staff and spectators is our main concern. The confirmation of England’s Test series against the West Indies is a positive step forward for the whole of English cricket, but much work remains to ensure we can safely deliver the domestic game this summer. Nevertheless, all of us at Derbyshire are desperately keen to play cricket this season, as soon as we can.
Many of you will have had the opportunity to hear from Billy Godleman and Anuj Dal, then subsequently a trio of the club’s coaches at recent Members’ Forums. I hope this contact with the club’s cricket staff was of benefit and I would like to thank them for proactively volunteering to engage with Members via Forums, call-rounds and messages of support at this time.
I said at the last Forum that the Supervisory Board had discussed a number of options and ideas relating to your membership but that until we knew just how much cricket we could play in front of live audiences it was too early to make a decision. I have outlined some of these ideas below. However, we are a Members’ Club and we are holding your money so we believe that it is really important to give you the opportunity to have your say and express your views. We know that we will not be able to please everyone of course – life is never that simple – but we can try and please the majority if we know how they feel.
Refunding memberships has problems. First of all, we may need the cash to keep the Club afloat – and second it will mean that you are no longer members and will not be able to participate or vote at an AGM for instance.
We could retain the cash and give the 2020 members a substantial discount on next years’ membership and/or we could offer some special member’s benefits such as vouchers to spend in the Club Shop or commemorative gifts such as framed and signed photographs or bats to recognise your contributions. We could also organise some special, exclusive events for the 2020 members with players and others during the winter.
It is possible of course that by next year we may have survived without the need to retain the cash and we could put it to good use by funding some ground development such as a new scoreboard and screen with a plaque listing the names of the 2020 members whose subscriptions financed the development.
You may well have other ideas and we would be very grateful if you would share them with us so that they can be considered by the Supervisory Board when it makes its decision.
It is important that our planning considers Member opinion and we welcome your thoughts on 2020 Membership. If you wish to do so, you can send in your feedback via the form below, via email to [email protected], or by calling 01332 388101. Please note there are a limited number of staff working remotely and the below form is the most efficient way for us to collate your feedback.
Thank you as always for your ongoing support. Stay well!
Kind regards,
Ian Morgan
Chairman
