The cricket season officially got underway this weekend as North Bay played host to the defending champions from Sault Ste. Marie.
The double header was played at the ball field next to the Callander Community Centre, which is officially the home field for the club.
There is also a new sense of excitement as Timmins is making its debut in the Northern Cricket League, making it four teams, along with Sudbury.
“It’s going to be a great year. There will more cricket opportunities for our members across the cities. All the teams are very excited, this weekend is the first game of the season and we’re really looking to have a good year,” shared Hariram Mukundan, the president of the Soo Cricket Club.
The sport is also growing in North Bay according to Royals team captain Harpreet Singh.
“We started five years ago with a small club with eight or nine people. It was very hard at the beginning to find people, especially because people are busy with their schedules with work, but now we have more international students here and we are growing and in good shape.”
There are now 22 players on the squad and only 11 can take the field, which Singh said gives his team a strong bench. This season the team has more sponsors and is very thankful for the support it has received from the municipality of Callander.
“We can now play cricket with a real hard ball, we were at a stage where nobody wanted to play with us because we did not have a proper field and now we do,” added Singh.
There are even plans to play beyond the North, as the NOCL has begun talks with Cricket Ontario which is the provincial body for the sport.
“We have moved forward with our registration which will give us access to tons of support and resources such as coaching and umpiring. There are lots of opportunities such as travelling down south and competing and also bringing southern teams up here to have games as well,” explained Makundan,
Sault Ste Marie got off to a good start, winning both matches against North Bay on opening day.
The Northern Ontario Cricket League will see each team play each other twice on their home fields. Once the regular season is over, the top two teams will play for the Championship on August 26.
