The Wllows was one man’s idea. Mike Dormer wanted to preserve all that was best about the game of cricket and to foster it in the coming generations. So he, along with 11 founders, created a cricket ground anda cricket club to do just that.

The first match was played at The Willows on October 24th, 1994. A quarter of a centrury later, the club has over 700 playing and other members. Of those there are many present or former first-class cricketers.

Of  the 25 or so matches plaed every season, three quarters are against school 1st XIs or regional rep teams. All of wich means that since that opening game against Christ’s College in 1994, more than three thousand school-age cricketers have had the chance to come and play at The Willows.

There they’ve enjoyed a ground that is impeccably tended, appointed and catered and as large as many test-match grounds.

And they’ve come up agains cricketers who have played to a high level, and who are keen to pass on their love for and knowledge of the game.

The Willows is firmly rooted in Loburn, North Canterbury, but its connections strech around the globe. There are now Willows members living in virtually every cricket-playing nation on the planet. Every year the club sponsors two young cricketers to spend a season with Matfen in Northhumberland and it also send an under-19 team, managed by a former first-class cricketer, on tours to India and Sri Lanka.

The membership has recently elected a new president and committee to steer the club into its second quarter centrury. There are many plans afoot. But the fundamental purpose will not change, to maintain all the best traditions of the game of cricket and to foster them in the young.