Ezuma
Club Cricketer
The Ballad of the Rookie Coach
The Set Up
It is January 2008. Somerset County Cricket Club has failed to reach the success it has deserved in recent years. Promoted at the end of the 2007 season after winning the division two competition in the County Championship, Somerset hope to make their mark on the division one teams, and become a dominant force in English first-class cricket.Over the past six years, the club has developed somewhat of a youth policy, selecting mostly youngsters in their line-ups, alongside more experienced (usually internationally) players, to help coach and guide the younger players. This has brought them moderate success, as in July 2005, they were the surprise winners of the third Twenty20 Cup, seen by many as a sign of things to come. The inclusion of Australian great Justin Langer was a huge boost for the club, as they look to push further and further into the future.
The newest signing for the county club may be its biggest in years. With the retirement of First XI coach Andy Hurry, after just one season, the team appointed a literally unknown entity in the cricketing world: a young man named Mike Diamond who, with aspirations of national dominance, quickly accepted the offer.
The Background
This is my second cricketing diary, and my first ICC diary. My original diary followed the story of the Australian domestic team, the Retravision Warriors. It was going along quite well and was relatively popular but, unfortunately, my Cricket Coach game crashed and I was forced to abandon it. Due to my enjoyment of this similar type of concept, I?m going to attempt to use a tiered narrative structure, which is a fancy way of saying that most of the match reports and news will be done in a third party manner, as if provided by a website. This will be supplemented by first-person reports that will provide back story and off-field ?real world? events.Something I want to make clear is that this game will not necessarily follow the journey of just one club. This is the tale of a rookie coach whose dream it is to coach the Australian national team. Any chance to move up in the ranks will be taken, so you may be following the stories of many different clubs. I do not know much about County Cricket, as it is difficult for me to completely follow it where I am (Perth, WA) so I will be learning more and more about the game as the story unfolds.
The Vision
Just further clarifying my statement that this will not follow one county club; it will follow one man?s journey through his coaching career, and any chances for this character to progress through the coaching ranks will be taken. I understand that this may make it hard for people joining halfway through the journal to catch up, but I believe it will provide a fairly original and (hopefully) intriguing view on the story.My coaching/captaining style tends to run along my preferences ? raw pace, aggressive batting and more of the above. I have little patience in players, and you will find me dropping players running through some bad form rather quickly, and trying to focus on the younger players of the club. My goal as a coach (if I were a coach) would be an equal focus on immediate and future successes, and I believe an equal distribution of youth and experience is a necessity.
The information on the front page here, I intend to keep current with the roster, records, etc. This might make things easier for readers to keep track of those things. I am planning on making a "Ballad of the Rookie Coach" banner in the not-too-distant future, but for now there will just be a title.
