NZBCA T20 Blind Cricket World Cup Campaign 2017

$1,695 of $50,000 goal

Given by 31 generous donors in 12 weeks

Help our 17 man (and woman) team and 4 officials get to the T20 Blind Cricket World Cup being held in India in February 2017

Nationwide

+12 images

10 countries around the world will be taking part in this World Blind Cricket Council World Cup - we want to make sure NZ is included in those teams! We have a team that has been described as the strongest NZ Team in a long time. But, they need to raise the funds to get there in a short amount of time.

New Zealand has not competed in a Blind Cricket World Cup since 2006. Between that time and now, the interest in Blind Cricket decreased as new sports came along. Players aged and although we still had strong participation within the sport, the participation wasn’t enough that the NZBCA saw value in sending a team to the World Cups – our team would not have been competitive enough for the competition we would be facing.

We also took this time to make big strides to redevelop the game and structure of our organisation within NZ – the Development Tour hosted in NZ between us and Australia in 2015 was a huge step forward as it had been almost 20 years since we had hosted another side at home. This put a spotlight on Blind Cricket in NZ and star5ted to gain interest from youth. Our participation in the Halberg Junior Disability games and St Kents disability sports days also brings attention to the sport for younger vision impaired participants.

We want to be able to offer current and new members a pathway to international representation and the next step forward in our growth and development is to take part in a World Cup. This will not only develop players who will be able to learn skills on a national level, but it will also develop our organisation which has been absent from decision making processes with the WBCC since we began the rebuilding process of our organisation and game.

NZBCA inc's involvement (page creator)

We are the national body organizing and supporting the NZ squad to get to this tournament. The tournament itself will:

• Develop players – a World Cup is a huge opportunity for players to access coaches and players from other countries and spend time with them learning or refining current skills.

• Establish relationships – not just for players, but for the NZBCA, an opportunity to establish relationships with other countries with the potential of future tours, access to resources (such as coaches and officials).

• Forming an elite part of player pathways. This will establish a full development pathway for players.

• Officials – developing officials on an international level. NZ currently has access to one umpire who is viewed as a qualified Blind Cricket umpire having umpired in Australia. This will give her an opportunity to develop her umpiring skills and will also gain interest through her Officials networks to hopefully develop an umpire and scorer pool for not only the NZBCA but local clubs to access.

• Allows ex-players to move into an official role such as a coaching role or managing role once they retire from playing.

About us

We are the governing body of Blind Cricket in New Zealand.

We oversee the day to day running of blind cricket across the country as well as being NZ's representative body to the World Blind Cricket Limited who have an affiliation of 10 countries.