Jersey is an island in the English Channel and has its own cricket team. In the ICC T20I rankings, they are placed 29th at present. They narrowly missed out on a 2026 T20 World Cup berth earlier this year in India and Sri Lanka, but such is their story in front of which their not qualifying kind of pales in comparison.
The man behind the rise in Jersey’s status on the cricket field is Jimmy Perchard, who, through extraordinary efforts, turned his garden into an international cricket field where many teams have come and played. Jersey is a self-governing British Crown Dependency but it’s closer to France (approximately 22.5km west of the Normandy coast). Right from a young age, Jimmy was a cricket enthusiast and loved playing whenever he could.
It was the year 2005 when Jimmy succeeded in fulfilling his dreams after years of planning. The ground in the Jersey parish of St Martin, with a population of 4,000, was ready for the big stage. “When everything’s coming alive, the trees are starting to blossom, the grass is starting to grow, and I’ve got the mower on, and you can smell that freshly cut grass, it takes some beating – I don’t think money can buy that,” BBC Channel Islands quoted him as saying.
Jimmy reminisced about how he got into cricket. Back in the day, in the 1970s, the farmers played cricket wherever they could find a nice field. “We used to go for a pint afterwards and say, ‘wouldn’t it be nice to have our own cricket ground?'” he said. In 2003, Jimmy received permission to proceed with his plans and relentless work followed.
“Sometimes you’ve just got to stick your neck out,” he said.
“I’m in a very fortunate position. I own the field alongside my house, and applied to planning, and so it was making that dream come true.
“We just had a little Portakabin and no pavilion, so we would do our best to change in the car and then make a pot of tea in the Portakabin.
“We got planning permission subsequently and then developed the ground by putting some picket fencing and some proper boundary infrastructure and sightscreens.
“We were very fortunate to have got some people to support the facility over the years with sponsorship, and it’s sort of grown since then – we’re still adding to it a little bit every year,” he added.
Jersey captain Charles is Jimmy’s son, and the national team has seen an upward curve of growth under him. He is a proud son who appreciates his father’s efforts at the Farmers Fields. “It really has helped the national side in its ambitions of potentially qualifying for a World Cup one day,” he said.
“A lot of the national side today have come through the Farmers pipeline.
“I think it’s gone a long way to help cultivate the talent that Jersey has today, so I think a lot of gratitude should be paid to my old man and the Farmers Cricket Club for its support in helping those young players come through,” he added.