By Nick Creely
There’s no secret that talented Victorian young cricketers, and certainly from the south-east, enjoy playing cricket at Richmond, but more importantly flourish in the highly successful program under Shannon Young.
The Tigers continue to build a strong reputation for developing some of Victoria’s most talented cricketers, with an influx of underage state representatives, contracted players and emerging youngsters making for one exciting list at Central Reserve.
Names like Jake Fraser-McGurk, Mitch Perry and Wil Parker are already well-known, having come through the program and now flourishing at state level, but there are more success stories on the horizon.
Young told Star News that it’s certainly an exciting time for the club, who are in the midst of a five-year plan to bring together the list and hopefully build into sustained success, both on-field and in progressing its players to the next level.
“It’s mostly young guys, the list we’ve built over the last few years, everyone’s in agreement, it’s pretty talented,” he said.
“Our job is to give these guys opportunities at first and second XI level and let them find their feet and understand the standard and individually what they need to upskill in.
“We made the decision three years ago to take on an AFL model I guess – traditionally, you have 13 or 14 guys you consider really crucial to your first XI plans, but we expanded that out to 20, particularly with Covid and one-day cricket, what we’ve seen is more interruptions, so we had to extend those guys.
“That’s the path we’ve gone down – in the last two years, we’ve played just over 30 guys in first XI cricket.”
The Tigers have had very little movement this off-season, locking away their exciting crop of kids, but have injected some experience in, with Berwick premiership player and ex-Casey-South Melbourne club champion Brendan Rose linking with the club in an exciting playing-coaching capacity.
“Rosey’s come across, he’s played some T20s for us, and he’ll probably increase our depth, and he’ll come across in a bowling coach capacity as well,” Young said.
“In terms of having a young group, if you’re going to go out and get senior guys, you want someone that’s going to offer a lot to the group, so Rosey’s much a recruit from an off-field perspective as much as on-field.
“He’s a good player, and from a depth point of view we expect he’ll be thereabouts.”
While on experience, the Tigers will be once again led by skipper Dom Matarazzo, who Young praised for his exceptional “communication skills”, while reigning Ryder Medalist Scott Edwards is locked in again but will only play eight to ten games because he will be representing Netherlands in the T20 World Cup this year.
While Young expects his Tigers to be competitive this season, and continuing injecting games into the kids while also focusing on winning games of cricket, he admits the club’s focus is producing Victorian and Australian cricketers.
“It’s all well and good to have this young talent, and get the talent identification right, we’ve worked really hard on our academy, but you have to give them opportunities, so for me, having 10 guys around the Victorian Under 19 setup, five or six in the CA system, and three obviously on Victoria’s senior list, seeing the development is super exciting, and it changes the way you coach,” he said.
“It changes how you evaluate performance, so what we’re building hopefully is the base for the next five years.
“We hope all these guys come through, play good cricket together and hopefully get to 50 or 60 games at the same time – from a coaching point of view, it’s the reason why I front up to do it.”
The Tigers have a stack of kids coming through state pathway systems, with Jordan Hesline, emerging off-spinning star Reiley Mark from Berwick who is one of the brightest prospects in the state, another local in Shobit Singh, all-rounder Dylan Tibbals, Zac Sleeman, Kyle Viccars all exciting talents.
Local pair Yash Pednekar and Jono D’Rozario who are continuing to build their game will also be key players in 2021/22, with spots in the first and second XI set to be hotly contested.
Young said the pair – hailing from Dandenong District Cricket Association clubs North Dandenong and Buckley Ridges respectively – are ones to keep an eye on this season.
“All those names are in a developmental phase so expect good things from all of them, but two who are a bit older are Pednekar and D’Rozario who I’m really excited about,” he said.
“Both Vic Country representatives, Jono was captain, and there’s never been a question mark over Yash’s talent, he really broke through in the twos with some big hundreds and put together some strong performances in the ones.
“Those guys are exciting – (Dylan) Tibbals is another one, he’s had injuries and manages that well, so if he gets a fair crack, he’s got x-factor – can take a new ball and whack it with the bat, has an arm like a cannon, and if there’s a focus on one-day games, we expect him to really come to the fore.”
With Covid-19 lockdowns preventing another proper pre-season, Young said it was a challenging time, but remains hopeful that cricket will resume soon.
“It’s near impossible to (plan) be fair – there’s some certain stuff, we had last year as a bit of a benchmark so we know it can be done,” he said.
“In terms of the playing group, we’re not super big on Zoom, most of my guys sit there all day with school and stuff – we’ve done a couple of little things, like a trivia night, split guys into groups.
“But in terms of planning, and practice matches, you’re basically putting a line through it until you get the go ahead.
“Obviously you’re governed by restrictions and how that looks for training – you’ve got to be hopeful and put on a bit of a brave face for your blokes. But planning goes out the window.”
The Tigers are fixtured to take on Dandenong at home to kick off the season, with Cricket Victoria hoping the season will start on 2 October.
