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Plenty of rich kids playing cricket out in Surrey. The difference in general technique by the time they are 12 years old between state school and prep school kids is the scary thing, for the boys at least. Seeing some of the "Tier 1" juniors climbing into cover drives was something to behold when my 10 year old daughter ended up in a very one sided under 11's cup game a week or so back.
Scrabble-
Yep very much this. One of the first team at our club has just gone to be Head of Cricket at the private school. Head of Cricket ffs. My oldest boy gets 2 hours a week of PE at comprehensive school and that’s mostly playing dodgeball.
We pay for our 2 to attend coaching weeks in the holidays and nets by a private company through the winter, but so do most of the parents of talented private school kids so you just cant catch up.
2 very talented kids at the club have been scouted at Northants by private schools and given scholarships which their parents have accepted as they know that’s the only way their kid is going to get a chance to go all the way, despite one of them finding the whole private school thing abhorrent. Don’t think I could do it.
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between state school and prep school kids
Yeah, at some of the coaching my daughter goes to the private school girls are getting in trouble for playing more than 4 times a week at school. "It's too much, I'll be writing to your Head of Cricket..."
Meanwhile they with a plastic bat and tennis ball at her state comp. No official wicket, they just use part of the playing fields (which are a mile from the school in a non-private park), but most of the time it is indoors. #ohthehumanity
It might be on the curriculum but youth cricket is far from accessible.
Stevethecoffee
Greenbank
Our son has started cricket lessons on a Saturday morning. 1.5 hours of good quality coaching that he really enjoys - and it's free up to the age of 9. Great for us, but a sign of how desperate cricket is for new blood, because kids don't get to see it unless you seek it out and pay bigtime for it*.
*or get a hooky stick for £50 a year, which we definitely don't do