Jack Bligh provided one. Jim Bellman offered his land too. And a paddock at John 'Jakes' McDonald's "where his wife Marg organised afternoon tea in their family garage" became a playing arena as well.

That's how it was in Grassmere Cricket Association's early days.

Hall-of-famer Kevin White made his debut for Bushfield in a paddock at Mailors Flat in 1958.

"It was Jim Bellman's paddock on the corner of Caramut Road and Ibbs Lane," Kevin, now 82, told The Standard.

"They were the days when the cars parked on the side of the road in the lane, all the gear was in the boot of the cars and to get onto the playing area they had A-frame type steps, three up, three down and over the barb wire fence."

Kevin, who played into his 60s, acquainted himself with different properties and he remembers the paddocks being a source of pride for the families offering them for weekly cricket matches.

"Jack Bligh's paddock was at Woodford," he said.

"Jack really looked after that ground, it was like the MCG.

"And they had a tank upside down with the side cut out of it and that was the toilet.

"There was another one behind the Bush Inn at Purnim. Purnim used it in the early days and then it laid idle for a long time.

"Then the association decided to play B grade games there. The concrete was still there and Stan Sharkie used to lay a lot of the malthoid wickets.

"It wasn't the first paddock behind the pub, it was about two paddocks down. You had to drive through one to get to it.

"We used to drive up to the Bush Inn for afternoon tea."

Peter McDonald, who made his debut aged 15 alongside Kevin at Bushfield in the club's final season in 1979, said the paddocks reflected the competition's participants.

"When it started they never used to start the cricket season until December," the now 57-year-old recalled.

"It was a rural-based competition and most of those players were dairy farmers.

"A lot would exhibit their livestock at the local shows and cricket ovals were paddocks and they had to cut the hay off them first."

Malthoid wickets became the norm and then synthetic as proper fields became common.

Long-time Mailors Flat competitor John McCosh said the malthoid wickets could be "pretty ordinary".

"It's a hard black-textured rubber and you'd have to stick it down and the biggest problem we had if you got any air bubbles under it, it just blew up," he recalled.

"Carpet came along and that was a big thing for country cricket for clubs that didn't play on turf."

Advancements in facilities were welcomed but one thing has remained the same - and will until the final ball is bowled in March, signalling the end of the 75-year-old competition.

"There was a very relaxed atmosphere at the GCA and that is actually why a lot of people enjoyed playing there," Rodger Henderson, a life member, said.

"It was social. The game was important but it wasn't everything."

Grassmere Cricket Association decided in November the 2020-21 season would be its last.

Plans are under way for the six remaining clubs to find new homes.

Two of those clubs - Grassmere and Wangoom - were among the three original sides in the inaugural 1945-46 season.

Bushfield was the other.

John, now 66, said the competition had welcomed and farewelled clubs across its lifespan.

"I went to my first meeting when I was 15 or 16 in the old supper room in the Grassmere hall," he said.

"In those days there was only five clubs and over a period of time it blew out to nine clubs and about 23 teams each Saturday. Fifty-five cricketers playing to 200 playing so that was significant.

"Clubs came and went, some folded and some never came back after they went into recess."

Peter's grandfather A.H McDonald was the founding president. He was there when the competition was formed on December 7, 1945.

His pop, dad Jakes McDonald, who played into his 80s, and uncle Angus McDonald make up more than 70 per cent of the association's hall of fame.

"I don't know anything different, I guess you could say I was born into it," Peter said.

"When I was in my peak playing days, that is when I had my two terms as secretary.

"The association was unique - other competitions have retired older blokes in their administration roles.

"All my playing career in the GCA, all the executive members were current members of their own clubs. But if you go on the executive, you take your club hat off."

Game time has reduced too, a sign of the times.

"I remember someone telling me about a grand final in the mid-1960s and they used to always play a grand final until a result," John said.

"You had to beat them outright and it went over six Saturdays. It was something like late April before they got the result.

"I think the rules might have been changed the next year. It was then reduced to four days and lo and behold now they play in one day."

Friendships were formed on the pitch.

Kevin and Jakes were good mates. One day Kevin asked if a teenage Peter could play for him.

"He was only about 15 at the time and it came about because Grassmere had a strong team and numbers and Bushfield were struggling to get 11," he said.

"Peter decided to have a game with us and he went on to have 28 wickets at an average of 15 and a batting average of 36."

Friendships were also tested.

"When Bushfield folded up I probably had to make the toughest decision I ever had to make between two good friends," Kevin said.

"Jakes was going to Mailors Flat as coach in '79-80 and he wanted me to go there and Normie Garner is one of my best friends and he was going to Purnim.

"I said 'what am I going to do here? I said the only way out of it is I'll play one year with each of you'."

He won a flag with Mailors Flat, playing in a grand final for the ages against Hawkesdale where each team scored in excess of 400 runs.

"I went with Jakes the first year and Mailors Flat were premiers and champions that year and I kept my promise the next year and went to Purnim with Norm and Rodger ('80-81)," Kevin said.

"I was lucky enough to make my best score in A grade and the best thing was it was with Normie.

"We had a 200-plus partnership, you don't do those things on your own."

Rodger, now 68, played for Purnim for 25 years, retiring at 49.

Kevin, who played for four clubs including Purnim and Grassmere, was one of his mentors.

"I was a wicket-keeper and I remember going to see Kevin," Rodger said.

"He had a net out the back of his yard with a bowling machine and I went and asked him for advice because I wasn't very good at wicket-keeping.

"He gave me these tips that I always remembered throughout my time. Kevin was a very good keeper, standing up close behind the stumps, very quick and nimble.

"He had a better physique for keeping than I did but I plugged away at it and was very fortunate I played in a very good side for 10 years."

Those words of wisdom are being filtered down the generations.

"I am mentoring a young wicket-keeper called Ayden Bosse and I told him 'when I started wicket-keeping I went and saw a bloke called Kevin White'," Rodger said.

"I drilled that into him. He must have listened because he's got very good at it."

Kevin, quick to deflect praise, quipped: "Rodger won the wicket-keeping award eight times".

The association's social side followed it to many country week campaigns in Ballarat.

But there was still an eagerness to perform well.

Kevin recalled the 1979 B grade final which hinged on getting a Bellarine opponent out.

"They had a bloke who had had a big week with the bat. He made one 200 and a couple of centuries," he said.

"In the final, he started off pretty well and hit a couple of fours and then Kevin Leske bowled a ball which probably won us the game.

"It pitched, hit the ground and took off. I think it kept fairly low and knocked his stumps out of the ground."

Kevin, who rated Woolsthorpe's John Pearce as the quickest bowler he kept to "in the days where we played with no helmets", credited Geoff Anderson for bringing "a lot of professionalism to Grassmere".

"He was captain of that team and he talked to you every night, right down to about having your boots clean," he said.

"Gee could he hit the ball. I remember I opened with him at Ballarat one year and I think we had a 100 partnership but he made about 85 of them. I just stood down the other end."

Those memories, and the ones formed off the field, are what Kevin, Peter, John and Rodger want to endure when the competition is consigned to the history books.

All four agreed with the decision with playing numbers on the wane.

Kevin, who delivered score updates on the radio across the south-west for decades, still wants to help "promote our little clubs" and "keep a team in their small communities".

Peter said there was a sense of inevitability and while sombre, it was now about keeping clubs afloat, using Northern Raiders (formerly Purnim) and Panmure, which has merged with Allansford, as examples of proactive thinking.

Both clubs are playing in the 2020-21 Warrnambool and District Cricket Association.

Rodger, who backed Purnim's decision to rebrand, too knows what is at stake.

"It's so important to keep those community assets going because a lot of those little towns have lost their pubs, lost their schools, lost their general store," he said.

"But if you've got somewhere people can go - it's like East Fram golf club, that's like a meeting hub for the community."

Rodger witnessed that community spirit first-hand when he lost wife Adele to breast cancer, aged 50, in 2005.

"Not only my club but the whole GCA got behind me and supported myself and my family," he said.

He said sporting clubs played a major role in boosting mental health. He and partner Claire Browne are supporters of charity Let's Talk which will speak to Northern Raiders' players this weekend.

Those sort of community-minded initiatives will live on when the GCA bows out. That will be its legacy.

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