Any good cricket coach will tell you that the key to building a solid total with the bat is to work in partnerships.
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If a pair of batters can combine to score the lion's share of the runs, it makes the job that much easier for the rest of the team to score and, ultimately, win.
And just as it's true on the cricket field, it's applicable to business and life outside the sporting arena.
Albury Council's contribution to a cross-border cricket hub, based in Wodonga, had been up for debate in the past week with councillors advised not to provide any more money to the regional centre until its initial success could be gauged.
The city was asked to provide $137,500 towards a $450,000 second stage of the cricket base at Birallee Park and, despite some reservations from council staff, it was a request that won approval on Monday night as councillors David Thurley and Alice Glachan sent down some short-pitched deliveries to one in another in an at-times tense meeting.
Cr Thurley and Cr Glachan both raised valid points in the meeting, asking questions that the ratepayers of Albury would expect of their elected officials.
Cr Glachan said "us as councillors will be beaten up if we support it and we'll be beaten up if we don't support it by the community".
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Cr Thurley countered that query by arguing that "we've signed an agreement, Two Cities, One Community, stop whinging and asking 'did they give us anything, did we give them anything?' This is what the NSW government and Victorian government have been doing for the last 50 years and it's got us nowhere, so let's not us get involved in it".
Cricket might not be everyone's cup of tea, and that's fair enough, but ultimately something has to be the first big ticket, bricks and mortar project of the Two Cities, One Community deal.
If a project like this, where it's predicted 60 per cent of children using the facility will be from Albury, couldn't win support, the third umpire would've been needed to examine the point of Two Cities, One Community in the first place.