October 2021: A Word On Umpiring

Club Captain Sian Craze on our fantastic umpires, how to get involved, and what our club players can do to help support the volunteers who help matches happen every weekend…

I want to acknowledge the amazing work that our volunteer umpires do every weekend – and to encourage more people to help out by umpiring a game.

It’s an exciting time to be an umpire at Surbiton. We have set up our very own Umpire Development Programme and we are confident this will help our club to create some of the best umpires around in the London Leagues. There's lots of support available for those new to umpiring (or a bit rusty!) and we have training sessions running and several experienced umpires offering coaching and assessments.

There are a few questions I get asked a lot by players and members at SHC.

Why should I sign up for umpiring?

• You become part of the new SHC Umpire team, helping you meet and socialise with more club members.
• Umpiring helps develop your own game - having a greater understanding of the rules can help make you a better player.
• Having an understanding of what an umpire's role is gives you an even greater respect for those who do your games week in, week out.
• Umpiring helps the club to fulfil our umpire requirements.
• And if you umpire, you don’t pay match fees on the day you umpire!

I’m interested, but I'm nervous I won’t be good enough...

• We have a tight knit group of umpires who support each other.
• There is an umpires' Whatsapp group that’s a good place to ask questions and get support for all things umpiring
• Our team will allocate umpires to the best game to fit the experience you have.
• You won’t know till you try and we would never let you loose on a team until we feel you are ready!

Some words of wisdom...
“You're only human and make mistakes. We don’t point out every time a player makes a mistake on the pitch!”
“If players gets 80% of things right during the game - they've likely had a good game. The same applies to umpires”

What can you do as a club player to support our fantastic and valuable volunteer umpires?

Our umpires are a vital part of making your matches happen every weekend and we believe that respecting the umpire is paramount - we are working with our captains to stamp out back chat, and promote positive and supportive communication towards our umpires at all times. This is added to by making them part of the wider SHC team! Please invite your umpires to join you for teas, always thank them for for giving up their time to make your game happen and say well done when they put in a good performance.

Thanks,
Sian