six honoured by the pca at personal development scholarship awards Yorkshire opening batsman Alex Lees, Derbyshire captain Billy Godleman, Glamorgan batsman Will Bragg, Leicestershire wicketkeeper/batsman Lewis Hill, former Surrey seamer Tim Linley and former Warwickshire slow left-armer Paul Best are the winners of this year’s Professional Cricketers’ Association Personal Development Scholarship Awards. The awards, which were introduced in 2013, reward the most proactive current and former professional cricketers in England and Wales who have sought ways to develop and improve themselves off the pitch. Lees and Hill were winners in the Newcomers category, Godleman and Bragg were recognised in the Current Players category and Linley and Best won the Past Player Progression Personal Development Awards. All six, who had to make a Dragon’s Den-style presentation to a judging panel, received £ 1,000 to use for further Personal Development course funding, resources of their choice or to reimburse costs already incurred. Linley also received an additional £ 1,000 after his quirky presentation, which included a practical demonstration of his barista skills, was highly commended by the judging panel of PCA Chief Executive David Leatherdale, Ian Thomas, the PCA’s Head of Development and Welfare, and two PCA Personal Development & Welfare Managers, Charlie Mulraine and Lynsey Williams. {{PCAScholarshipAwards2017}} Linley has trained as barista since he was to retire because of injury at the end of the 2015 season and is now in the process of setting up his own coffee shop in Leeds. ” If you have got a passion and you want to explore that avenue then the help is there from the PCA. You just have to ask,” Linley said. ” I really have used the PCA a lot in different facets and I feel so fortunate that I was a professional cricketer because I have had this great organisation behind me through a difficult period since my retirement.” Best, who was forced to retire because of injury just before the start of the 2015 season, is now training as a solicitor with London-based Clyde & Co having previously qualified to teach English as a Foreign Language during a spell in Malaysia. ” Personal Development gives you great life skills and it helps you to develop as a person. It gives you the comfort of knowing that when you finish you have got the confidence to move into something else other than cricket.” Godleman, whose varied CV includes training as a counsellor at Newman University in Birmingham, completing an introductory course in sign language and obtaining a Level Three coaching qualification, has found that doing things away from cricket has helped him to develop as a person. ” Personal Development has changed me as a person in that I don’t feel that my self-worth as a human being is connected to my performances out on the field,” Godleman said. Bragg gained a degree in Civil Engineering during his early days on Glamorgan’s staff but he has also gained valuable experience on work placements and internships. ” I have completed a degree, got post-grad qualifications in wealth management and also undertaken a number of internships in South Wales and the South West, just to try to build that plan up for when the inevitable time comes to stop playing cricket and to make that transition as smooth as possible,” he said. Lees has followed Bragg’s example by doing work experience with a range of businesses including Cameron’s Brewery, Pennine Business Partners, Shaw Pallets and Players Cars and also studying for an online HND diploma in Business Management. ” The course has given me an insight into various disciplines within business and has also allowed me to understand different sectors and the attributes needed in order to work in life after cricket,” Lees said. Hill is also planning for the future by completing a home study website design course which has enabled him to re-design the website of his father’s engineering company and to set up his own e-commerce business selling sports equipment. ” Cricket is the best job in the world but it’s a short career span and you do have to plan for life after. You have lots of spare time to do other things while you are playing, especially in the winter when you can do courses,” Hill said. To find out more about the PCA’s Personal Development & Welfare Programme, visit here
