Please find below an outline of Pre-Match and Match Day Management to help our U9s play their matches. These details, plus U9s Match Rules and a U9s Pairs Match Scoresheet can be downloaded from the attachments found at the end of this page.

Twickenham CC / Pitchero website - Team Admin

Match day helpers/ Team managers are set up within our Twickenham CC / Pitchero website as ‘Team Admins’ so that they have access to Admin areas of the website. This allows to select and send out Team Selections, message Parents, update/ cancel fixtures, request updates to player availability.

Pre- Match Preparation

Select a side using Pitchero:
• An outline of how Team Selection works within the Pitchero website can be found here - https://help.pitchero.com/knowledge/team-selection
• Parents will have hopefully updated their child’s availability and you’ll select a side from those who are marked as ‘available’.
• When the team is selected parents should confirm their selection. Any that ‘decline’ selection will have to be replaced with another player if possible.

Before the match best to confirm/ arrange who will the Umpire will be and you’ll also need a scorer.

Once team is selected / ‘Published’ in Pitchero best to send an additional message to all parents in U9s group to inform them of the Team selected so that they can see who is playing and those who have not been selected (The Pitchero system does not automatically inform those who have not been selected). As U9s matches are pairs matches at this stage you can confirm the pairs the players will bat together in. Also best to confirm the venue and start time, especially when an away fixture.

Check arrangements with opposition manager.
If home side confirm with opposition manager address of venue (Twickenham Green), start time, etc. As well as time and venue details, best to check how many players opposition wish to play the match with – The league guidelines suggest 8 players per side but having 10 players allows for more children to be involved. The amount of players who can play isn’t a fixed stipulation so can be arranged between managers. I would suggest not to have anymore than 10 players as the match will last way beyond 2 hours!

When the away side hopefully the opposition manager will confirm the venue address with you well before the match day.

Opposition managers contact details can be found on the MJCA website - Club Contacts

Here are the MJCA Rules as a guide as well - MJCA Rules

Before the match best to confirm/ arrange who will the Umpire will be for our side and you’ll also need a scorer.

Match Day Preparation

Home matches set up:

Bring Match Ball, Scoresheet, Team sheet (Match ball supplied by the club and balls will be passed on at start of the season - Within the Pavilion Kit Cupboards we provide a match day equipment bag that has some cricket kit)

Take down ropes and poles from around the square

Using equipment held within the Pavilion Kit Cupboards to…
• Mark out pitch – U9s pitch is 17 yards (All U9s matches will take place on the Artificial/plastic pitch so white chalk can be used to mark out bowling and batting crease)
• Stumps and bails to be placed on pitch
• Mark out boundary with white cones
• Tables and chairs for scorers
At end of match all equipment, tables, chairs to be tidied back into pavilion.
At end of match return the ropes and poles around the square

For away matches items needed will be Scoresheet and team sheet, though taking a spare ball is sometimes handy

If Umpire, have something to help count to six, coins are the traditional way of keeping track of the balls in an over.

The two Captains will have to toss a coin to decide who bats or bowls first in the match.

Opposition manager:
Best to have a quick chat with opposition manager before start of match. Decide if you wish to bowl all overs from one end, discuss where you’ll be looking to award wide deliveries, and how strict you’ll be on LBW decisions. Having these catch ups an help ease the match and maybe avoid contentious decisions.

During the match:
Umpire will select who bowls
Umpire is allowed to adjust the field / where the players are standing when needed
Wicket Keepers - Ideally Wicket Keeps will use Wicket Keeper Gloves and pads so they can get used to using them (Gloves and Pads provided in the U9s Match-day Equipment Bag). For the match recommended that 2 Wicket keepers are used who swap after 10 overs - In a 10 aside Match - this allows these players to also bowl.

End of Match:
At end of match all equipment, tables, chairs to be tidied back into pavilion.
Return the ropes and poles around the square.

After Match:
Pass on the score/ result of match to Junior Secretary.
Result will be added to PlayCricket - http://twickenham.play-cricket.com/website/web_pages/94669.

U9s – match conditions:

- 17 yard pitch
- 10-a-side pairs cricket (or 8-a-side if agreed with opposition manager)
- 20 overs per team (16 overs if 8-a-side match)
- 4 overs per batting pair
- Pink / Incrediball to be used
- No more than 3 overs per bowler
- No fielder (except for wicket keeper) to be closer than 11 yards to the batsman
- Score starts at 200 for batting team
- 5 runs are deducted for each wicket
- After each wicket the batsmen swap ends unless it is the last ball of the over
- Wides and no balls are 2 runs for the batting team with no extra ball bowled except in the final over where extra balls are required (agree with the opposition manager before match if you wish for the ‘extra balls in final over required’ rule to be in place or not)
- A ball bouncing more than twice or rolling along the ground before it reaches the popping crease should be called a no ball, i.e. the ball can bounce more than once before reaching the popping crease
- Balls that reach or pass the batsmen (in normal batting stance) above waist height are no balls

Last updated: February 2024