Grounds Management Team of the Year: Dave Owen

Cricket Collective Awards 2026

Dave Owen picked up the Grounds Management Team of the Year award at the recent Cricket Collective Awards ceremony, on behalf of Erdington CC and Walmley CC who are based at Spring Lane

Joe Chapman

2026-10-23T10:00+01:00

Oh, to be a member of ground-staff overseeing the preparation of a cricket pitch this past summer.

In what has been an often sweltering and impossibly dry spell throughout the season, ground-staff across the country have been up against the temperatures and the elements to ensure that cricket continues to be played on quality and safe surfaces.

Dave Owen, who volunteers at Spring Lane Playing Fields, is one such individual who has had to, alongside others, work particularly hard to produce good quality pitches for Erdington CC and newer incumbents Walmley CC, who came on board last year.

As well as cricket, Spring Lane Playing Fields, a 30-acre space which Dave describes as an ‘oasis’, is the home of rugby, football and, now, American football.

The work Dave and the team have put in over 2026 and prior to that earned the Grounds Management Team of the Year award at the recent Cricket Collective Awards, held by Warwickshire Cricket Foundation at Edgbaston Stadium.

“I am very privileged to have accepted this award,” Dave tells us. “It says team on the award and, without the help of Jon Newis and Harry Wyatt at Walmley, to do the work with the lawn-mowers…it has been a very difficult summer to be a groundsman, put it that way!

“Spring Lane in Erdington is a very special place. It has been a ten-year project and cricket is the reason that it still exists. It is important we have kept two grass pitches there and cricket is going to be a big part of its future.

“Cricket is still integral - it is the grassroots sport to the facility, but with Walmley CC coming on board, they have brought professionalism. Rather than being used just on weekends, it is now a facility which is used seven nights a week in the summer.”

The site is due to have a new pavilion in place in the coming weeks which will bring the entire venue and its various sporting teams closer together.

Naturally, such a location requires a lot of maintenance, especially in the height of summer, and with that comes dedication and a volunteering drive led by Dave.

“I’m very, very proud to win this because I know just how much effort goes in at every club across the county, often with limited resources just to get a pitch ready so that 22 people can have a game on it,” he explained.

“The Spring Lane charitable organisation took the lease off Birmingham City Council. The trustees there, Andy Truman and Phil Spence, have done a wonderful job to keep the site entirely for sport.

“It’s a fabulous site and these awards are as much for people like them as it is for me.”

Producing and keeping pitches, be that the out-field or the cricket wicket itself, is a real skill. It isn’t just mowing your lawn.

Spring Lane doesn’t possess all of the facets many cricket grounds do, which means when the weather acts as it has done this past summer, Dave and co have had to get creative.

“We haven’t got any watering facilities so this summer was the first time in ten years I was covering pitches to keep the sun off it rather than the rain,” he added.

“Every groundsman in the country will feel the same way - but they’ve managed to get games on. Pitches haven’t been as good as potentially they would’ve been in other summers, but they’ve worked incredibly hard to get games on, on safe pitches.”