The decision of the KNCB Board to change the playing days for the top three leagues from Sunday to Saturday for the first six weeks of the season is in its second year. We take a look at how clubs and the KNCB alike have evaluated the impact of these changes.

The idea behind the schedule change is that it would allow youth players to play on Sundays, avoiding competition with with other, larger, sports that play matches on Saturdays. Having youth and senior cricket on two different days serves a dual purpose, firstly allowing for better field availability and secondly affording talented youth a chance to play both their youth matches and senior games.

The KNCB's own evaluation of the schedule change is broadly positive. According to Rod Lyall, vice-Chairman of the KNCB, "…this [the change] was not welcomed by everyone. But after two years in which the decline in junior numbers has been halted, 2014 is seeing an increase of 8% in the number of teams over last year's figure. The number of players recruited in the younger age groups rose last year, but this year's increase comes mainly among the older youth, which suggests that clubs are also becoming more successful at retaining their young players." This is indeed a positive effect, as it would mean that the KNCB youth plan has begun to bear fruit. Dr. Lyall concluded by saying, "Too few of our member clubs have an active youth programme, and our work with primary and secondary schools is only just beginning to bear fruit. We are well short of the targets we set for ourselves in 2011, but we are undoubtedly heading in the right direction."

When similar questions were posed to boards of various Topklasse and Hoofdklasse clubs, however, reactions were mixed. To start off with one of the success stories, HBS was able to double the number of youth cricket members in the last two years (to approximately 100 members), and they claim this is at least in part due to the schedule change. They did suggest more schedule changes that would, in their opinion, be beneficial such as: moving the under-10 matches to Wednesday as well (currently the under-9s play on Wednesdays).

Another club that was positive about the change was VOC, who said: "We used to struggle during weekends in May/June to assemble enough players for our cricket teams because of football- and hockey matches being played at the same day. Also our first team players act as coach for youth teams hence it was crucial to keep the two apart and matches of both not on the same day." They were able to go through the 2013 season without cancelling any of their youth matches, which used to be a perennial struggle for them. The change to Saturday has also allowed them to entertain more spectators, which has actually increased their bar turnover.

Rood en Wit, Quick, Kampong and HCC also indicated that they were in favour of the change, some of them even mentioning that they would endorse any change that would allow the retention of youth players. In fact of these clubs VOC, HBS, Rood en Wit and Kampong advocated a change of all senior cricket from Sunday to Saturday. HBS and Kampong touched upon an important point when they mentioned that only moving the top three leagues is beneficial but still creates an issue for them. Their second teams play in the Overgangsklasse or lower and therefore they cannot integrate some of their more talented youngster into their development teams. This is indeed an issue because the jump from the under-16s to Top- and Hoofdklasse is huge. Rood en Wit even indicated that their senior teams are keen to play on Saturdays, evidenced by the fact that they have four Saturday teams and three Sunday teams.

The option of moving all competitive cricket to Saturday is one that surely dawned on the powers that be, but a significant hurdle in doing this is that many league players work on Saturdays. This change may result in an even more streamlined league structure, which would be to the detriment of Dutch cricket.

Excelsior '20 and Dosti indicated that they were against the change from the outset. Excelsior '20 said, "In our club we don't have many problems with youth who feel pressure to chose between another sport (soccer, hockey, etc.) and cricket." They then highlighted another obstacle in the schedule change, "Excelsior'20 is a club who have many spectators at their home matches and we know from the past that matches on Saturdays attracts less spectators than matches on Sundays." The loss of spectators was a key consideration for certain clubs as it meant a loss of bar income. Excelsior '20 and Dosti both indicated that their bar turnovers took a significant hit last summer. This is an important consideration, as the loss in income may not be offset by the gain in youth cricket members.

Dosti don't have their field available on Saturdays in May and therefore have been forced to rent fields at other clubs this season. Starting from the 2014 season it was no longer possible to rearrange matches, or play them on the Sunday, and this meant that Dosti has had to play a few of their home games at neutral venues. This brought with it both extra costs and a decrease in bar turnover.

Excelsior '20 touched upon another interesting point by saying, "We feel that children who feel pressure to choose between sports in the end will never chose for cricket, even when their cricket matches are scheduled on Sundays." Even though the change may allow for more youth cricketers, if something else conflicts with the new cricket schedule, which it undoubtedly will at some point, are these youth members going to continue playing the sport? If not, this could be catastrophic to clubs that have also been earning less than they were in the past.

The debate is clearly still alive in the eyes of some of the clubs and it remains to be seen if the retention of youth stands the test of time. Clubs still have reservations with the current structure of moving only the top three leagues, which in some cases doesn't allow them to acclimatise their youngsters to senior cricket. This is an area that will surely need to be addressed in the near future, if the newly retained youth are to be given a chance to become first team and/or national team players. What is clear from the research is that clubs are actively attempting to revive Dutch youth cricket to its former glory. The increase in youth members at certain clubs is clearly down to the additional emphasis they have placed on it. The effectiveness of the schedule change is therefore difficult to quantify. There are clear pros and cons to the change but the hope is that Dutch cricket is the eventual winner.