John Williams: I want every club to have a voice in the Liverpool Competition

Date: 26th January 2012

A Paul Edwards copyright exclusive for L&DCC Official Website.

John Williams has encouraged all the members of the Bridging Finance Solutions Liverpool Competition to make constructive contributions to the running of the league. Speaking barely a week after his election as chairman of the organisation, Williams believes that he is building on excellent foundations but he still hopes the Competition can be even more "inclusive".

"Over the last twelve months I've noticed a change in that more clubs feel they can take a hand in the overall organisation of the league," he said. "People have their own views and I want every club's leading members to feel those views are heard, always providing they don't simply want to moan and carp."

Williams see a move towards greater inclusivity as one of the two challenges facing him as he settles into his first year in office. The other is to ensure that the league and all its clubs derive the full benefit from being an ECB Premier League.

"It's a challenge in itself to meet the targets set by the national governing body," he said. "We're unusual, I think, in that we split our funding 36 ways and we need to understand what being a Premier League means, so that all 36 clubs can derive as much benefit as possible from something which directly affects only 12 of them each season. We must make sure we understand our place in relation to both the LCB and the ECB."

But as to the twin fundamentals of any cricket league - the standard of the cricket played and the quality of the grounds - Williams believes both to be "outstanding" in the L&DCC and he suggested that it is no accident that a number of contracted professionals and members of Lancashire's Academy hail from Competition clubs.

"There is a significant movement of players from east to west taking place in Lancashire at the moment and I think that can be explained by the standard of cricket in our league and the facilities on offer," he said. "And this may be an appropriate time for me to acknowledge the outstanding work done by Eric Hadfield, Malcolm Barber and Chris Weston.

"I'm also happy to say that the Management Committee as a whole was pleased with the tenor of the AGM and the contributions of clubs' representatives. We sorted out some constitutional anomalies and it's set us up to move forward. It was a really good meeting."