THE Hamilton and District Cricket Association (HDCA) has held its Annual General Meeting for 2022, as it plans for the upcoming 2022-23 season.

The HDCA executive committee has seen all current members returned except for Craig Dimond who stood down due to unavailability while Simon Van Kalken and Simon Close were elected to the committee for the first time.

Matt Brown (Byaduk) has been elected as the new senior vice president, while all other committee members retained their current positions.

Long-serving president, Lloyd Ilett, was excited for the coming season, as the HDCA looks to have A grade return to playing one-day and two-day matches for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic struck society.

“The A grade competition will return to seven one-day and seven two-day matches, while the lower grades will remain all one-day format matches,” Ilett said.

“The committee of management (the member clubs) voted to return to longer format matches in the top grade, while also voting in some other changes.”

The new MCC Laws of Cricket that come into effect as of October 1, 2022, have been ratified and a new ball shall be allowed to be taken upon the completion of 80 overs in any innings.

Ilett said a lack of numbers in one of the grades is likely to trigger a shake-up for the upcoming season.

“With only two or three teams nominated for a B grade competition, the clubs were given a number of proposals to have these teams play this season,” he said.

“After the vote was taken, the clubs sent the final decision back to the match committee to create either two or three lower grades with the 23 teams that were nominated for the lower grades.”

Ilett announced that the HDCA would be hosting the Cricket Victoria Youth Premier League Under-16 male carnival for the next two summers after the very successful staging of the event last summer.

The HDCA will provide cricket programmes or competitions for all ages and genders from 5-year-olds through to Over-70s for male and female participants.

A new women’s representative competition being organised for teams across south-west Victoria and Hamilton will enter a team after the success of last season’s trial games.

The upcoming A grade season begins on October 1, with all other grades to be staggered to start across the following two weeks.