The Homies & the Popz
  America's Cricket Team

Club History 
 
The Compton Cricket Club was founded in 1995 by Ted Hayes and Katy Haber. This unusual cricket team comprised of a group of homeless men from Dome Village in LA, Ted Hayes and his sons Theo and Isaac, travelled to the UK in September of 1995 as The LA KRICKETS, funded by Prudential Life Insurance and BUM EQUIPMENT.

In June of 1996 the CCC held a cricket workshop in Compton, birthing the world-renowned Compton Homies and the Popz. These young men joined the cricket team specifically to find an alternative to the gang activities that ruled their neighborhoods. Their mission was to provide an alternative path, away from the gangs, violence and prisons and to give them a vision of a positive, productive future.

Since its formation, the Compton Cricket Club has successfully brought cricket to the streets of LA. It is the only American-born cricket team in the world. They have won the British Cup twice, the trophy of The LA Social Cricket League (LASCA), against other worthy sides composed of British, Pakistani, Australian, Indian and South African expatriates.

The Compton Homies and the Popz toured the UK three times in 1997, 1999 and 2001, sponsored by organizations such as British Petroleum, Channel 4, Intertops.com, Lashings and Maxim Magazine. In Britain, they played a tremendous diversity of teams, which included a team made up of members of the Royal Family staff at Windsor Castle, The Lord’s Taverners at Lords, and the world renowned Lashings team that included former W. Indies test-captains Richie Richardson, Jimmy Adams and Brian Lara. One of their most interesting matches was at Hambledon, against an Aboriginal All Stars team from Australia, captained by the Legendary Barry Firebrace—the first time such a side had toured The UK since 1868.

A tour of England, in 1999, incorporated a trip to Northern Ireland. A Cricket match against the British Civil Servants team was complimented by a game of Hurling against a Catholic team, a game they learned specially for the trip. In a specially arranged meeting, by then Under Secretary of State “Mo” Mowlam, the team presented the head of the Ulster Unionists, David Trimble, a Hurling stick. And to Gerry Adams, leader of Sinn Fein, they presented a British cricket bat. Shortly after that historic meeting a new breakthrough was reached in the Northern Irish peace agreements.
In February 2011 the team made an historical tour of Australia as the first ever All American Cricket Team to tour “down under”. Games against the indigenous All Black Redferns and the Johnny Mullagh XI were the highlights of this groundbreaking tour, until Barry Firebrace played with the Homies against the Australian Cricket Society in Melbourne, exactly ten years since the historic Hambledon game.

It was in The Windsor Castle, Club House in the presence of HRH Prince Edward, The Earl of Wessex, that the Homies and the Popz,Theo and Isaac (CLOTH) performed the first ever HIP HOP Cricket Rap “Bullets” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMoocnRm1Xs ). They subsequently performed for the Lords Taverners in the Lords Club House. In Australia and the UK it has been shown on MTV, has been voted the most popular song on Australia's most popular music TV station, and recently was voted Number One in the Top Cricket XI cricket songs in the Guardian. (http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2009/apr/01/andy-bull-cricket-music-songs).