VCA Umpires and Scorers Association
Fellowship amongst Cricket Umpires and Scorers
THE COMMITTEE
President: Greg Azzopardi
Greg joined the CV panel in the 2013-14 season and has officiated in 189 games across all grades. Greg is part of the Premier First Eleven Panel and was previously appointed to the Victorian State Panel where he officiated in WBBL, BBL and CA State Second Eleven matches. Outside of cricket, Greg has recently celebrated 36 years at BQ Design, a soft furnishings manufacturing business and is a Director of the company. Greg, along with his wife Poppi, have 14-year-old twins, Chris and Zara, and two older children, Jake who has served in the Australian army now for nine years and Jessie, who is in her fourth year as a Victorian police officer. Greg also has a musical background which stems from a very musical family. For over twenty years he worked in Melbourne’s pubs and clubs performing music and just recently, he has returned back to the stage. This is Greg’s third year on the VCAUSA committee and he has been an Association member from the start of his CV career.
Vice President: Jamie Wyatt
Jamie joined the VCAUSA and CV Umpiring Panel in season 2000-01 after umpiring in the Sub-District Cricket Association the prior season. After three seasons, and a change of work, Jamie ‘retired’ from umpiring and returned to playing, spending the next 11 seasons playing in the Bendigo and Mercantile Cricket Associations. In season 2014-15, Jamie re- joined the CV Panel and has now umpired 233 Premier matches across all grades. Jamie has been an enthusiastic participant in the Easter Crockett Shield matches, as 12th man in 2001 to playing in 2015, 2017 and 2019. This is Jamie’s second season on the VCAUSA committee. He is married to Rebecca and has three children
Secretary: Gerry Schembri
Gerry joined the CV umpires’ panel in 2006 and is hoping to umpire his 300th premier match this season. Prior to joining the CV Panel, Gerry spent one season umpiring in the Victorian Sub-District Cricket Association after a twenty-year absence from the game due to family and business commitments. Gerry is a life member of the VCAUSA and has served on the Committee of Management in various roles since 2009. Gerry is also passionate about the biennial Easter Event with SACUSA and has been the Easter convenor since 2011. After 42 years of working as an accountant, he retired in July 2022 and now has more time for cricket, travel and other interests. Gerry is married to Sylvie and has two adult children. The 2023-24 season will again present plenty of challenges for our Association and I’m confident that our new committee of management is able and willing to represent our members in the season ahead.
Treasurer: Jeff Diamond-Smith
Jeff's love affair with cricket started a long time ago. remembering waking up in the middle of the night and hiding under the bed to listen to the ABC broadcast of either the Ashes or the West Indies tour, on his transistor radio. Jeff had an underwhelming career on the field as a right-hand, opening batsman and a left-arm Chinaman bowler. and made a couple of centuries but J Grade on the mats isn’t exactly the MCG! When family commitments and a bad back curtailed a floundering career, Jeff decided that he wanted to stay involved and took up umpiring. He spent 11 seasons with the VTCA officiating in 10 Grand Finals and met such luminaries such as Paul Jensen and Bob Parry. At the end of the 2006-7 season Jeff decided to further his umpiring career and joined the Cricket Victoria panel and he is still enjoying it 15 years later. He gets great support from his wife, Leanne, and three children, who are all now in their 20s, and who know that their father won’t be around the house in Summer on a Saturday and the occasional Sunday. Upon retirement, Jeff took up volunteer work, under the guidance of Alan McCarthy, and tour guiding at the MCG. He is now hoping to use his experience to assist on the Committee of Management of the VCAUSA.
Committee Member: Dan Bomford
Dan joined the CV umpires panel in 1979 and has umpired 667 matches across all Premier and VWCA grades. Dan is a member of the prestigious CV 200 Club and is one of three members of the Panel to have exceeded 600 Premier (or higher level) games although in Dan’s case these have all been Premier games, the majority of which have been in First Grade.
Dan has served the Association in the roles of Secretary (ten seasons, 1985-6 to 1987-8 and 2010-11 to 2016-17), Treasurer (12 seasons, 1983-84, 1984-85 and 1993-94 to 2002-03), Vice-President (five seasons, 2005-06 to 2009-10) and has been a Committee Member for the past five seasons. He was awarded Life Membership of the Association in 1989.
Dan and wife Bernadette enjoy their family life with three children and seven grandchildren and somehow Dan still finds the time for his “other loves,” running half marathons and goal umpiring during the “off-season.”
Committee Member: Paul Jensen
Paul's introduction to cricket came via listening to the Ashes Tests on the radio from England. His early playing days were with his local VJCA Club Newport ANA, and he was a batting all-rounder. He commenced umpiring in the VJCA in 1977/78 and commenced on what was then the VCA District Panel in 1978/79. He's been a member of the VCAUSA from 1978-79 to the present including seven seasons in the role of Secretary. Paul is a member of the prestigious CV200 Club, umpiring Premier Cricket from 1978-79 to 2010-11. His career total to date is 512 matches, including 319 Premier First XI, and 21 First Class and List A matches, plus the 1993/94 and 1994/95 1st XI Grand Finals. He has also umpired in Italy, France, Slovenia, Holland, Germany, Thailand, Burma, New Zealand, Austria and the UK. Paul has been Umpire Advisor/Mentor to Metropolitan Cricket League, VJCA/VTCA, VSDCA and CSB and he has been an Umpire Advisor/Manager since 1988 - umpire development is his passion. This passion has been enhanced since the 2022-2023 season where he serves as an on-field umpire mentor for the CV Premier 4th XI competition
Committee Member: Damian Herft
Damian joined the CV Umpiring Panel in 1999 and has served on the VCAUSA Committee since 2017. He umpired a total of 396 matches, 298 of them in Premier Cricket and 239 of those in 1st Grade. With 200+ 1st XI matches, Damian is a member of the prestigious CV200 Club. Prior to joining the CV Umpiring Panel, Damian umpired one season in Sub-District Cricket and one in Dandenong District Cricket Association and before taking on umpiring, Damian also played local cricket for 20 seasons, primarily with Moonee Ponds Cricket Club, where he was elected to Life Membership in 1992. Damian retired from on-field umpiring at the end of season 2016-17 and was a Cricket Australia Match Referee from 2017-2020, overseeing 52 Cricket Australia matches. For the VCAUSA, Damian is primarily responsible for the maintenance of the VCAUSA Website. Outside cricket, Damian previously worked for Telstra for 38 years and now works for Cricket Australia with the National Teams, and is also the CV State Umpire Development Coach and Umpire Selector. He enjoys landscape photography and Agatha Christie movies, and is married to Caroline with one adult son
Committee Member: Bharath Rao
Bharath joined the CV panel in the 2019-20 season and made his 1st XI debut last season. Bharath is part of the Premier Performance Squad. Outside of cricket, Bharath has 13 years of Corporate and International Health Insurance Partnerships experience across Bupa, Medibank and his current role at nib. Bharath is also a late night/weekend comedian having performed not only in Australia but also in Asia and Europe. Aside from this, Bharath is also a qualified sommelier and the right person to talk to about the kind of wine to drink from the time you wake up, until you get to bed. This is Bharath's first year on the VCAUSA committee.
Committee Member: Josh Hallam
Traveling down from Ballarat, Josh joined the CV panel in the 2018-19 season and has officiated in 65 games across the Fourths through Seconds. He has also stood in a third XI Grand Final. In addition to umpiring, Josh has just commenced his 14th season on his cricket club committee, he is also a part of the BCA Female Cricket Subcommittee & team manager for his club’s women’s team. Beyond Cricket, Josh is engaged to Sharra, his partner of 12+ years. Josh works for MaxiTRANS, a truck trailer manufacturing company based out of Ballarat. Josh has been a member of the VCAUSA since he commenced with CV & after representing the Vics in Adelaide this year he is very excited to welcome both the VCAUSA & SACUSA to his home club in Ballarat for Easter 2025.
Committee Member: Viraj Soman
Viraj started his cricket umpiring journey with the Mercantile Cricket Association (MCA) in the 2009-10 season. 3 seasons later, he migrated to the Victorian Turf Cricket Association (VTCA). He played for Carnegie Cricket Club on Sundays while umpiring with VTCA on Saturdays. He joined the CV panel in the 2013-14 season. He has stood in over 260 cricket games across different competitions, including some school and community games. His CV games tally is above 165 games, and counting…
Professionally, he works as a digital marketing consultant at Latitude Financial Services. Over his 11+ years of career, he has helped many businesses across different industries. He lives with his wife Neha and a 3-year-old cat Loki. Neha is a software tester at Coles,
and Loki is a freeloader. He enjoys watching movies and web series, loves food and tries different cuisines. He joined the VCAUSA last year and it's his first time on the committee, though he has been helping with website updates since last year.
Committee Member: Vivek Kumar
Viv joined the CV umpiring panel in the 2014-15 season, having previously been involved with Queensland Cricket Umpiring panel (2012 -2013) and Dandenong District Cricket Association(2010 to 2012) In his early years he Played School and University cricket in India and migrated to Australia for the love of cricket and seeking better work life balance. Since joining our panel he has officiated in over 150 CV matches and has had the honour of officiating in three Grand Finals.
Viv is married to Amrutha and they have a son Hritwaugh (named after Viv’s idol- Steve Waugh)
Outside of Cricket, he is employed with Ricoh Australia and has extensive experience in Customer Relations and Support.
Viv is looking forward to being part of the VCAUSA committee and making some positive contributions.
Scorer Representative: Mike Ringham
Mike started scoring at school in England in 1947. He had a short break in 1954 when he became the Chef’s Writer on the R.M.S. ”Himalaya”. In 1955 he met a passenger on a blind date, got engaged on their fifth date and migrated to Melbourne and married his sweetheart, Margaret, in 1956. They had two daughters, Joanne, the oncology nurse at Rosebud Hospital, has two sons, Matthews 20 and Adam 19. Susan is still single and is a dental assistant in Melbourne. He joined the Essendon Cricket Club as 2nd XI scorer in 1956 and became the 1st XI scorer in 1960 as well as joined the First-class panel in 1964. A move to the M.C.C. took place in 1975 where Mike took over the 1st XI as well as the duties of Club Statistician, which he has continued for the past 48 years. Mike stood down from scoring in 1991 due to promotion as Schedule Planning Manager at Ansett Airlines. He retired 1996 due to Margaret’s ill health and was able to take up his pen again. Another break from Scoring came in 2010 when they moved to Rosebud, where Margaret passed away in 2017. The Beaumaris complex opened in 2018 and Mike was able to resumed his scoring with the 3rd and 4th XI’s. Last year he transferred to the Women’s 2nd XI and the Marg. Jennings Cup Teams. Since he resumed scoring in 1956, he has scored over 1100 matches, including 40 Test Matches and travelled to England for the 2nd and 3rd World Cup Competitions as well as the 1985 Ashes Tour. Mike has tried since the 1980s to get the hierarchy to train scorers in the fundamental rules of scoring, and to familiarise them with the Laws that affect scoring. He is hoping to make some progress with his ambition of Scorer training during his time on the VCAUSA Committee.