Parramatta District Cricket Club - ‘CUMBOS’ in World War 1

At this time of the year (25th April Anzac Day) Australians young and old, across breadth of our Nation, pause and take time out to honour the debt of gratitude we owe the service men and women who fought in a range past Wars to preserve Australia’s freedom and way of life.

The Parramatta District Cricket Club [formerly known as Central Cumberland] looks back with great pride on the patriotism and bravery displayed by many of its young playing members 110 years ago who answered the call of duty and joined the Australian Armed Forces to fight in the ‘Great’ War – the World War 1 conflict that raged from 1914-18 and whose battlefields took a tremendous casualty toll on the participants.

From the viewpoint of the modern player, the atmosphere and prevailing patriotic fervour emanating within the community at the start of World War I, would be extremely hard to appreciate. Australian society in general was still very ardent supporters of England and the King, and it was regarded as the unbridled duty of eligible Australians to enlist and join the great battle for the Empire. The player drain on the Central Cumberland Electorate Cricket Club during the war years was such that it chose to stay affiliated to the NSWCA but suspended entering teams in the competition between seasons 1915/16 and 1917/18, and recommencing in first grade in 1918/19.

The attitude of the Club’s hierarchy was to actively promote and encourage its players to ‘go to war’. This is most vividly illustrated on the first page of the Club’s 1914/15 Annual Report, which evoked the following challenge in bold, full-page print:
PLAY THE GAME

CHANGE
Your
BAT
FOR A
RIFLE!

Play the game - in Khaki.