Central Lancashire Cricket League is to press on with its expansion plans

The Central Lancashire Cricket League is to press on with its expansion plans following the withdrawal of the league from talks on the proposed Greater Manchester Cricket League which will launch its prospectus at the Emirates Old Trafford on Thursday (30 April).

Last minute efforts by some of the Rochdale based CLL clubs were aimed at trying to persuade the GM steering committee that an evolutionary approach would gain more support from within the 18 CLL clubs

If successful it would have meant a change to the structure released by the GM steering committee to one that would keep league names alive while maintaining the obvious advantages of promotion and relegation in a pyramid system.

The Rochdale Group felt it was a proposal which could, and should, have been considered both now, and much earlier.

But throughout the whole GM pyramid process it appears there was strong resistance to anything other than the revolutionary approach based on the model used by the Leicestershire Cricket Board when it reorganised some five years ago.

The CLL management committee feels that the steering group did not recognise the open democratic structure of the CLL constitution from the outset.

It also believes that there has been far too much focus on external communication through the press and social media, from the steering group, and not enough internal communication to the clubs directly.

Many clubs are concerned by the fact the GM pyramid steering committee has never recognised or even acknowledged the ground breaking decision made by the CLL to attempt to form two leagues of 12, therefore reducing the amount of cricket played and increasing the competitiveness of the cricket that is played through to the end of the season.

Promotion and relegation in the CLL also helped, as the weaker clubs have been able to rebuild and redevelop by playing teams more in line with their capabilities.

A spokeman for the CLL said: "This change was very much driven by the players, and the open democratic nature of the League enabled this change to take place far ahead of any other league.

"It is a pity that the GM pyramid league group could not find a way to fully engage the CLL and learn from the experiences they encountered along the way.

"Recent figures show that the CLL is providing Lancashire County Cricket Club with more age group cricketers than any other league which could be included in the GM pyramid. The figure has risen over recent years which would suggest that the CLL is doing something right.

"It is very unfortunate that common ground could not be reached, however the time is right to move on and continue a journey started three years ago.

"The CLL is now working towards its own own prospectus which will be released within a couple of weeks to give all clubs in the area a fuller picture of what we can offer and give them another option.

"Obviously our tradition of having some of the strongest clubs in the county among our number, and our open democratic nature, will feature strongly in our prospectus."