“My daughter Lola has thrived under Darren’s coaching, had fantastic opportunities and made fantastic friends. We are so glad she found Darren and Twenty20 Community Cricket.” Louise, mum of Lola
Twenty20 Community Cricket are launching a brand-new coaching programme for girls, specifically designed to plug the gap in the development pathway for those curious about transitioning from soft to hardball cricket. The programme comes hot on the heels of MD and Founder Darren Talbot winning the Outstanding Contribution to Coaching award at the recent Surrey Cricket Foundation Cricket Collective event at the Kia Oval.
It is a course Darren dreamt up after much time spent in and around the girls’ cricket coaching environment, during which he noticed how female players are underserved in comparison with their male counterparts.
“Boys typically play cricket from a young age,” explains Talbot, “and come into a club environment where there is a long-standing progression pathway through which they can travel. In many cases for girls, those pathways are still being constructed, and though it is fantastic that the quantity of females coming in through the likes of the All Stars programme is so high, many drop off when faced with the proposition of hardball training.”
The Twenty20 Community Cricket “Transitioning to Hardball” programme is designed to entice these very players to stay in cricket, allowing them to make an informed choice in an environment tailored towards their needs. It takes place each Friday evening at RGS school in Guildford, running until December 13 and followed up with matches across the summer over and above club games, which take priority.
It is a logical extension of the girls’ development programmes that Twenty20 Community Cricket have delivered so successfully over recent years, as acknowledged at the aforementioned Surrey Cricket Foundation awards event. The Outstanding Contribution to Coaching award recognises those who have gone above and beyond in the county of Surrey, in the name of expanding reach and opportunity for people to play this great game of ours.
“I am very proud of the work we’ve undertaken to drive girls’ participation,” explains Darren. “Whilst the award is recognition for all of the hard work put in by the team, it is important that we recognise that there is more to do to truly level the playing field.”
The premise of Twenty20 Community Cricket is to bring quality cricket coaching to state school educated children, at a time when such provision has dwindled beyond recognition. The programme has now expanded to include the participation of over 50 girls across the 11-18 age range. Success has come not just in strength of numbers though; whilst several have gone on to play at county age group level and in adult cricket, Darren and his team also manage the MCC Foundation Guildford Hub, for which the girls won the national tournament at Lords in both 2023 and 2024.
More can be heard from Darren in a forthcoming exclusive interview on the Community Cricket Podcast from Tuesday 1 October: https://pod.link/CommunityCricketPodcast
Find out more here: https://www.twenty20cricketcompany.com
