Yorkshire Cricket Foundation (YCF) – the official charity of Yorkshire County Cricket Club (YCCC) – have announced a number of new cricket kit recycling hubs in the region to continue to help support accessibility in the game.
New Cric-Kit recycling hubs will open at Headingley Cricket Ground, in Leeds, Park Avenue Bradford Cricket Ground and the Sheffield Caribbean Sports Club – where people can donate and receive cricket kit.
READ MORE: YCF Calls on club to donate, reuse and recycle cricket kit
The Cric-Kit recycling programme, launched last September, 2022, in partnership with Zero Waste Leeds, who run the Together for Sport initiative, aims to create awareness and a culture across Yorkshire and the UK whereby donating, recycling and reusing sports clothing is done more frequently to help break down barriers in communities to participation.
With the continued rise in the cost of living this could be a very difficult and challenging year for a lot of people and buying cricket equipment is expensive – it’s the biggest barrier to taking part in cricket.- Kendal James, YCF Participation Manager
Kendal James, Participation Manager for YCF, and founder of the initiative, said: “We are delighted to be expanding our Cric-Kit scheme with the introduction of the new flagship recycling hubs in Leeds, Bradford and Sheffield.
“With the continued rise in the cost of living this could be a very difficult and challenging year for a lot of people and buying cricket equipment is expensive – it’s the biggest barrier to taking part in cricket.
“By working together with the Cric-Kit hubs we’re using our platform to play our part in helping accessibility in the game and we look forward to working closely with the hubs over the coming years.”
From the beginning of March through to April 2023, the three Cric-Kit hubs at Headingley Cricket Ground, Park Avenue Bradford Cricket Ground and the Sheffield Caribbean Sports Club will accept cricket kit donations with another donation window running later in the year from September until October.
All donations will then be recycled and reused across a number of community programmes run by YCF in Yorkshire.
Kendal added: “With the rising cost of living heavily weighing on the minds of families across the country, the Cric-Kit donation windows present an opportunity to give back to families who may not have even thought they could have supported their children to play cricket because of costs involved.
“By asking our cricket community to donate their outgrown or unused kit means that they can be redistributed and help increase accessibility.”
The expansion of the Cric-Kit programme has been supported by the Yorkshire Sport Foundation, who have funded Cric-Kit storage units for donations, at each of the three locations – in Leeds, Bradford and Sheffield.
Glenn Holdsworth, a Development Manager for Yorkshire Sport Foundation, said: “As an organisation we are clear in our ambition for it to be easy and enjoyable for everyone in Yorkshire to be active. We know moving more, being active or taking part in sport can help people to improve their lives.
“The Cric-Kit recycling project is a brilliant way to deliver this goal and help people into a fun and engaging activity. We’re delighted to be supporting the Yorkshire Cricket Foundation to deliver this.
“We know there are inequalities in our communities and working alongside other organisations to support people is at the heart of what we do.”
The Cric-Kit initiative is also supported by Zero Waste Leeds – the people behind Leeds School Uniform Exchange, an initiative that is making it easier for people across Leeds to share and access good quality second hand school uniform.
Gill Coupland, Co-director of Zero Waste Leeds, said: “We are delighted to continue to support Cric-Kit – a wonderful scheme that helps to ensure that no child is excluded from playing cricket because they don’t have or can’t afford the right kit.
“By unlocking the resource of used sport kit, and donating to the Cric-Kit hubs in Yorkshire you are helping to reduce waste and make this great team sport accessible to more children.”
The creation of the new hubs builds on the YCF’s Cric-Kit launch last year – at the Bilal Sports Centre – where members of the public were able to select cricket kit for free from an extensive ‘walk-in-wardrobe’.
It was one of the first events in the city to create awareness around recycling sports kit and distributed roughly 1,100 pieces of cricket equipment and garments, donated from across Yorkshire Cricket, which would have cost around £18,700 if bought new, according to Together for Sport research.
For the future YCF aims to open another Cric-Kit hub based at Scarborough County Cricket Club.
How to get involved
For more details about how to donate, please click on the link below:
& to find out more about Cric-Kit, please contact Kendal James, the Participation Manager on:
