However, you will be hard pressed to find anyone who loves the game of cricket more than Merv Bourke.

NSW Country Cricket has restructured itself to include the establishment of eight zone cricket academies which includes Newcastle and Illawarra.

The appointment is a coup for Bourke, who will now have a chance to help those potential stars of tomorrow excel at cricket.

“I love the game itself and seeing younger players reach their potential,” he said.

“For some, that potential might be second grade cricket, others it might mean hopefully playing for Australia, so it’s all about helping them and ensuring they enjoy the game.”

While cricket continues to excel in the Hastings region, Bourke is hopeful of seeing a player from the area one day wear the baggy green for Australia.

“We’ve done well as a sport in the Mid North Coast and we have half a dozen players playing first grade down in Sydney,” he said.

“What we’d really like to see is a player from the Hastings play for Australia such as Lismore has had with the likes of Phillip Hughes and Adam Gilchrist.

“It would be great if we had a junior player reach first class cricket in the next 10 years.”

Born in Dubbo, Bourke has lived in Port Macquarie since 1988. He was introduced to cricket at an early age with his two older brothers, Patrick and Paul, players themselves.

It seems the cricket blood lines don’t end with Merv, as his son Darren is also a representative wicket keeper and batsmen.

“Cricket has been my main sport despite a few other winter sports at different times,” he said.

“I began playing cricket as a child and my two older brothers played too, so cricket was engrained at quite a young age.

“When I arrived in 1988 I found myself coaching the school side, which led to weekend coaching and rep cricket and it has grown from there.”

Wayne Richards Park is now well known to cricket enthusiasts as the newest turf wicket in the Hastings and one of the key figureheads in its development has been Bourke.

“Cricket development depends a lot on having turf wickets available,” he said.

“If you’re going to play at a high level you have to play on turf.

“It’s been a bit of a concern for a number of years that we have a lack of turf wickets in the Hastings so when the opportunity arose three years ago to get on board with trying to get this turf wicket down I was pretty involved with other people in the local association.”

With all of his contributions to the game and ongoing developments as a coach, Bourke has no plans to settle down as his passion for the sport he loves continues to thrive.

“Nothing will change for me,” he said.

“I’m very passionate about cricket and it’s a labour of love. You wouldn’t do something if you didn’t enjoy it.

“It doesn’t matter what level whether it be Saturday morning cricket or representative teams, while I’m enjoying it I’ll stay involved.”