Lordswood cricket club chairman Derek Stearn believes they have the foundations in place to build on the 1st XI’s title success.

A five-wicket win at Holmesdale on Saturday was enough for Lordswood to secure the Kent League Premier Division title.

Stearn saluted the club’s skipper Calum MacLeod and the many youngsters that helped towards this summer’s success.

He said: “Since Calum became skipper, about 18 months ago, the man has been outstanding.

“In our first eleven we have Calum in his early 30s, Linden Lockhart 32, Jack Laraman around the same age and the next one is Ed Taylor who seems to have been around for years, yet he is in the mid-20s.

“The rest are under the age of 20 so there is only one way we are going as a team and that is to go on and win it again next year.

“We are there to be shot down now but we have some more good youngsters coming through aged 15-16 and in a year’s time they too will be knocking on the door of our firsts.”

It was Lockhart who was crucial in bringing MacLeod to the club and Stearn believes the 34-year-old former Scottish international has made the difference, taking a team with three successive seventh-placed finishes to winning the league.

MacLeod, who retired from international cricket in October. is now teaching in the Towns.

“He has been a great asset to our club,” said the chairman.

“Thanks to Linden, because he got him involved with us when he moved to the Medway Towns.

“At the beginning of the season I remember I was playing for the 4s and he was skippering the 1s and I asked how he thought the season would go and he looked at me and said ‘have you seen my team? I feel like a grandad! They are kids.’

“After three weeks, having beaten Blackheath and Hayes, I saw him and said ‘what do you think now? He said, ‘I tell you what, these youngsters are half decent aren’t they!?’

“As a chairman, I voted for Calum to be my clubman-of-the-year. He made the difference with the 1s. I think everyone can see that but Calum doesn’t like taking all the plaudits because he knows at the end of the day it’s a team game.

“He is always talking up the youngsters and how good they are.

“Calum deserves the praise, he has made he difference. We have benefited from his international retirement. Over the last two or three years he has played six or seven games, whereas this year I think he missed one.

“Linden started the season saying he wouldn’t be available for many, only two or three, but he played in 50%. He saw in the first game he played that something was going on, he saw a difference and that difference was primarily by the leadership of Calum and young people taking the opportunity.”

Three of the 1st XI team turned out for the under-19s the following day, Owen Palmer, Connor Dale and Max Wood, in a side that includes plenty of other promising players like Josh Rollings.

Wood was one of the stars of the season, the open bat wicket-keeper who finished the season with 25 catches and five stumpings.

He joined the club as a youngster, starting out in the 3s. He and fellow teenager Dale put on 240 for the first wicket when playing for Stearn’s Sunday side as 16-year-olds and quickly progressed up to the senior side.

It’s a key element of the Lordswood success story.

Stearn said: “We do have a very good and successful colts section and whatever grade of cricket you play it is an important part of any team to have a Colts team and one run in the right way.

“I used to play for New Ifield and the worst mistake they made was getting rid of their Colts, a few years down the line you have nobody coming through. You are reliant on word of mouth and you will end up not having a cricket team.”

South African overseas player Thando Ntini was another plus for Lordswood this season and he’s already been signed up for next season, arriving here as a quality bowling addition but contributing plenty with the bat too.

Lordswood can’t pay out the levels some do in the Premier Division and Stearn got tough when the 2nd XI - who won the Premier 2nd XI last season - made financial demands the club couldn’t meet.

They were relegated from Division 2 this season, in a rejigged Kent League, after the players who led them to the title left but Stearn is confident they will come back strongly under their current skipper.

He said: “We have a new captain who took it on himself to build a new XI, he has a squad, yes they have been relegated but they have returned to what (former chairman) Richard Cross used to say are ‘the Lordswood family values’.

“They may have only won two out of 18 games but they performed better in each game they have played and next season when we get two or three new players in the 2s they will bounce back and be promoted.”

Stearn and the team partied hard on Saturday night after promotion and he’s taking many of them to breakfast in Chatham this Saturday ahead of a day down the coast, where they’ll meet up with former chairman Mr Cross.

He said: “I am really proud of the guys and very proud of being Lordswood cricket club chairman, taking over from Richard Cross, a great man. who is now down in Cliftonville. He was umpiring at the club a few weeks before and we said we would have 10-12 coming down for an end-of-season drink. I think there might be a few more joining us now!”