Cricket's dominance in Somerset proves boon for Taunton School

One-club city status helps Tom Abell's alma mater

Taunton School are benefiting from the success of their local county side, Somerset, according to head of cricket, Pete Sanderson.

Sanderson spent 23 years working for Somerset in various coaching capacities before making the move in 2016, and he reckons that being effectively a one-club city, without a major football team to compete with, has helped to nurture an early love of cricket in his pupils.

"If you're in an area where cricket is strong, then kids are coming into cricket before they even get to school age," he said.

^{Somerset's Tom Abell learnt his cricket at Taunton School [Harry Trump/Getty Images]}

"We have a strong club network in Taunton and the surrounding area of Somerset as a whole. That definitely helps the development of the game. All clubs around here do massively good work to promote the game and develop an interest in it to start off with."

It helps, too, that the structure of the school's summer term means that players really only miss the first third of the club season before becoming available every Saturday. 

"We link into the clubs around us," he added. "We sponsor two of them. I went to a presentation last week, so I am looking to get our coaches doing some work with local coaches to help our local clubs in a different way, which would also benefit the players around us."

Taunton was also the alma mater of Somerset captain Tom Abell, which has presented its own benefits – none more so than a recognisable face as the image of the game in the region.

"They can see him and it makes it more real," said Sanderson. "Some of them aren't too far away from that. With Somerset doing well, that helps us all."

Taunton have benefited from having as experienced a figure as Sanderson at the helm.

"I was at Somerset for 23 years, but that was in youth cricket," he explained. "I have the same philosophy, but it is a bit of luck that my philosophy is the same as the school's philosophy. When I was in charge of youth cricket, it was basically to produce cricketers.

"But that is the minority. And when you work that out, you have to make sure that you provide the right service for the majority because you have to look after the whole game. You can't just go: 'Right, you're going to get lots of opportunity because you're really good', and then someone else not get opportunity and then hate the game and stop playing it.

"That is no good to the development of the game. I have always had an ethos of development of players but not at all costs, and not at the cost of the rest."