Durham Cricket are partnering with Karbon Homes and Durham County Council to deliver their biggest campaign of free summer cricket courses with food, aiming to remove barriers to participation and introduce more children to the game.
Durham Cricket’s Development Department will run over 20 free All Stars Cricket and Dynamos Cricket camps across Durham County in the school holidays thanks to funding from England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) and Sky Sports but for the first time all sessions will come with free healthy lunch for participants through the new partnership.
The initiative will introduce more children to cricket, while supporting families and pupils in receipt of free school meals through the holiday period.
The campaign will run in local cricket clubs and schools across the county during late July and August, with 20 All Stars Cricket programmes and 4 Dynamos Cricket camps being delivered by Durham’s coaching staff.
All Stars Cricket an activity-packed children’s cricket programme for boys and girls aged five to eight and Dynamos is the next step up – a programme for eight to 11 year-old participants, which is centred around game play and new skills. Normally, taking place over 6 to 8 weeks, during the school holidays All Stars will be delivered in the form of one or two-day holiday camps.
All Stars Cricket and Dynamos Cricket are normally £40, but thanks to ECB providing hundreds of free All Stars places and Sky Sports funding Dynamos programmes, children aged 5-11 can enjoy these activities for free. Through Karbon’s and Durham County Council’s support, food will be provided on every day of activity, ensuring that children can access and enjoy cricket without a cost barrier.
In addition to this, Durham Cricket are giving free junior membership to participants who sign up to of the free summer programmes, welcoming participants into the Durham family and allowing them to experience professional cricket at no cost this summer.
All children who sign up will receive the free participants pack for each programme. All Stars participants will receive a backpack, cricket bat, cricket ball and personalised t-shirt with their name, with Dynamos participants getting a New Balance personalised t-shirt with name and number.
Darren Brown, National Programmes Lead at Durham Cricket said: “We are very excited to be able to deliver an inclusive and exciting initiative this summer.
“Thanks for Karbon and the Council’s backing all sessions come with free food – something that was really important for us to provide in order to remove barriers to participation and we are so glad that this campaign has been made possible.
“The initiative will introduce more children to the game and reach those families that otherwise might not have been able to pay the full price of the programmes.
“We look forward to delivering a busy programme of activity across the six weeks.”
All Stars Cricket and Dynamos Cricket have already introduced over 2,000 boys and girls to cricket this summer, with the free holiday camp initiative aiming to reach more new participants for an even bigger summer of cricket.
Paul Moralee, Karbon Homes Community Investment Manager, said: “We’re so excited to have Durham Cricket on board as part of our free Holiday Squad programme.
“Holiday Squad helps keep children active throughout the summer holidays and this is exactly what the All Stars Cricket classes will provide.
“Having the support of a fantastic organisation like Durham Cricket means that we will also be able to reach even more people in our communities, with the classes taking places at cricket clubs across the region.”
Cllr Ted Henderson, Durham County Council’s Cabinet member for children and young people’s services, said: “We are pleased to hear that our Fun and Food programme is helping children across County Durham to get a healthy bite to eat while they are trying their hand at cricket. These sessions are not only fun but good for children’s health, through the exercise they will be doing and the food they are served.”